The literacy and education of medieval nuns has been a subject of dispute and study in recent years. In his third Index of medieval libraries, David Bell presents a comprehensive list of all manuscripts and printed books which have been traced with certainty or high probability to english nunneries. A systematic listing of the books available to english nuns, and in the process an indication of the wealth, the intellectual level, and the spirituality of english nuns from the Conquest to the Reformation.
Identifying nuns as the first feminists and sweeping in its scope and insight, "Sisters" reveals the treasure of spiritual capital that religious women have invested in America. 25 photos.
“Fascinating profiles” of remarkable nuns, from an eighty-three-year-old Ironman champion to a crusader against human trafficking (Daily News [New York]). “In an age of villainy, war and inequality, it makes sense that we need superheroes,” writes Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times. “And after trying Superman, Batman and Spider-Man, we may have found the best superheroes yet: Nuns.” In If Nuns Ruled the World, veteran reporter Jo Piazza overthrows the popular perception of nuns as killjoy schoolmarms, instead revealing them as the most vigorous catalysts of change in an otherwise repressive society. Meet Sister Simone Campbell, who traversed the United States challenging a Congressional budget that threatened to severely undermine the well-being of poor Americans; Sister Megan Rice, who is willing to spend the rest of her life in prison if it helps eliminate nuclear weapons; and the inimitable Sister Jeannine Gramick, who is fighting for acceptance of gays and lesbians in the Catholic Church. During a time when American nuns are often under attack from the very institution to which they devote their lives—and the values of the institution itself are hotly debated—these sisters offer thought-provoking and inspiring stories. As the Daily Beast put it, “Anybody looking to argue there is a place for Catholicism in the modern world should just stand on a street corner handing out Piazza’s book.”
Hallelujah, it's a book! After proving itself to be the "funniest calendar of the year" (according to Gene Shalit), "irresistible" (USA Weekend), and "habit-forming" (Maxim magazine), the Nuns Having Fun calendar has inspired Nuns Having Fun, a book of endearing nuttiness. Catholic kitsch doesn't get any funnier. Written by Maureen Kelly and Jeffrey Stone, pitch-perfect co-authors of the nuns calendar and the New York Times bestseller Growing Up Catholic, Nuns Having Fun features hundreds of sisters in full habit, cutting loose and having a hoot. Here are nuns in the surf ("This is even more fun than walking on water"), nuns in bumper cars ("We brake for Jesus"), nuns in a beer hall ("Ale Marys"), and nuns in the museum, huddled in front of a study of nudes ("It's okay to open your eyes. Sister Wendy says it's art"). There are nuns on skates, at bat, at the theater, skeet shooting (nuns with guns!), even hitting the slots (you know it's for a good cause). The 125 images are from the 1950s and '60s, black-and-white and possessing a pure retro charm; the written material is all-new. Drawing on their years as parochial school students, the authors explore the lore and legends surrounding nuns, including Favorite Punishments from Nuns, Nuns Say the Darndest Things, How to Recognize a Nun After Vatican II, a Wimple Watch, and List of People Who Could Have Been Nuns. As Sister says, "To err is human. To laugh is divine."
Impressionistic and dreamy, a nine-year-old girl immediately feels that she might be called by God when a Catholic missionary speaks to her third grade class at a Catholic school. The idea of this calling embeds itself into her, haunting her through elementary and high school, after which she chooses to enter the convent. Her story follows the five years she spent as an Adrian Dominican nun struggling to balance her desire for a secular life with her great fear of turning her back on God's call. Her stories are sad as well as joyous, inspiring as well as unsettling.
On 31 August 2008, Sister Jesme left the Congregation of Mother of Carmel. The authorities repeated attempts to have her declared insane, she says, left her no other option. This book, a first of its kind in India, is an outpouring of her experiences as a nun for thirty-three years. Spirited and fun-loving, from a good family, deeply-rooted in Catholicism, Jesme was drawn to religious life at seventeen after a Retreat at junior college. As a nun, seven years later, she felt distressed at the many ills growing inside the convent and being forced to remain silent about them. There was corruption, by way of donations for college seats; sexual relations between some priests and nuns, and between nuns; class distinctions whereby the cheduthies, or poorer and less-educated sisters, did menial jobs; and a wide gap between comforts and facilities enjoyed by the priests and nuns. Jesme was permitted to complete her doctorate in English Literature, to pursue her passion for literature, cinema and teaching college students. She exposed them to classic films, believing that aesthetics enhances spirituality. But these joys were clouded by the troubles she faced. Searing, sincere, and sensitive, Amen is a plea for a reformation of the Church and comes at a time of its growing concern about nuns and priests. It affirms Jesmeâ¬"s unbroken spirit and faith in Jesus and the Church, living like a nun, but outside the Four Walls of the convent.
They are known as the Brides of Christ. They wear all-black robes tied with heavy rosary beads and crucifixes that would make any child wince. They cover their heads with vast, winglike hoods. They have no legs but roll along on silent casters. They do not flinch from handing out swift and painful smacks with a switch, cane, or paddle. With photographs of these secretive sisters doing a few of their favorite things—frolicking in the sea, shooting guns, and lying prostrate on the floor, among them—Scary Nuns explores what goes on behind closed convent doors. Included are brief histories of some of the most notorious nuns and orders, as well as thoughts from famous thinkers on what it is to be a nun, that illuminate the mysteries of these wimple-wearing women who roam Gothic cathedrals around the world. Nuns are scary. You don't have to be a lapsed Catholic to think so. But if you are, you'll find Scary Nuns terrifying.
The literacy and education of medieval nuns has been a subject of dispute and study in recent years. In his third Index of medieval libraries, David Bell presents a comprehensive list of all manuscripts and printed books which have been traced with certainty or high probability to english nunneries. A systematic listing of the books available to english nuns, and in the process an indication of the wealth, the intellectual level, and the spirituality of english nuns from the Conquest to the Reformation.
Examinations of the culture - artistic, material, musical - of English monasteries in the six centuries between the Conquest and the Dissolution. The cultural remains of England's abbeys and priories have always attracted scholarly attention but too often they have been studied in isolation, appreciated only for their artistic, codicological or intellectual features and notfor the insights they offer into the patterns of life and thought - the underlying norms, values and mentalité - of the communities of men and women which made them. Indeed, the distinguished monastic historian David Knowles doubted there would ever be sufficient evidence to recover "the mentality of the ordinary cloister monk". These twelve essays challenge this view. They exploit newly catalogued and newly discovered evidence - manuscript books, wall paintings, and even the traces of original monastic music - to recover the cultural dynamics of a cross-section of male and female communities. It is often claimed that over time the cultural traditions of the monasteries were suffocated by secular trends but here it is suggested that many houses remained a major cultural force even on the verge of the Reformation. James G. Clark is Professor of History at the University of Exeter. Contributors: DAVID BELL, ROGER BOWERS, JAMES CLARK, BARRIE COLLETT, MARY ERLER, G. R. EVANS, MIRIAM GILL, JOAN GREATREX, JULIAN HASELDINE, J. D. NORTH, ALAN PIPER, AND R. M. THOMSON.
