A friend of mine worked in Rome for six years (2007-2013). She is a devout Catholic, and has a great interest in religious life....not to join, just to learn about and discover it. In that regard she visited hundreds of convents in Rome, and throughout Italy. She said that in Rome itself, there are very many more Orders of nuns that wear the "old habits" like this good sister than we are lead to believe. You just have to search them out. And she did. She said that one thing in Italy holds true as it does in the USA. The more liberal an Order, the older the members, and the less candidates it has. As in the USA, the habitless Orders in Italy have a median age in the 70's, with some approaching 80's. She said some world wide liberal Orders based in Rome have median ages approaching 80, and these Orders are suffering bigtime meltdowns because they can't care for the 90% of their members who are retired and need specialized nursing care. One Order has 840 world wide members, but only 220 who are less than 65, and only 28 less than 50!! LOL!!! The liberal Vatican II Orders did it to themselves, and deserve no consideration.
My friend investigated hundreds of houses of nuns, as well as monks....and found that there are some very ancient Orders which may not have bigtime numbers (some have less than 60 members), but their median age is low and they do have anywhere between 1-10 novices and others in training. They have survived the rot of Vatican II religious life by keeping to tradition. So the lesson is that though an Order of traditionalist nuns like this good group of sisters pictured may not be huge numbers wise....they will most likely still be stable and viable long after the Sisters of Mercy, Religious of the Cenacle, Franciscan Misisonaries of Mary, Salesian Sisters, Daughters of Charity (with their big totals but median ages of 77+), have disappeared from the scene.
A friend of mine worked in Rome for six years (2007-2013). She is a devout Catholic, and has a great interest in religious life....not to join, just to learn about and discover it. In that regard she visited hundreds of convents in Rome, and throughout Italy.
ReplyDeleteShe said that in Rome itself, there are very many more Orders of nuns that wear the "old habits" like this good sister than we are lead to believe. You just have to search them out.
And she did.
She said that one thing in Italy holds true as it does in the USA. The more liberal an Order, the older the members, and the less candidates it has.
As in the USA, the habitless Orders in Italy have a median age in the 70's, with some approaching 80's. She said some world wide liberal Orders based in Rome have median ages approaching 80, and these Orders are suffering bigtime meltdowns because they can't care for the 90% of their members who are retired and need specialized nursing care. One Order has 840 world wide members, but only 220 who are less than 65, and only 28 less than 50!! LOL!!!
The liberal Vatican II Orders did it to themselves, and deserve no consideration.
My friend investigated hundreds of houses of nuns, as well as monks....and found that there are some very ancient Orders which may not have bigtime numbers (some have less than 60 members), but their median age is low and they do have anywhere between 1-10 novices and others in training. They have survived the rot of Vatican II religious life by keeping to tradition.
So the lesson is that though an Order of traditionalist nuns like this good group of sisters pictured may not be huge numbers wise....they will most likely still be stable and viable long after the Sisters of Mercy, Religious of the Cenacle, Franciscan Misisonaries of Mary, Salesian Sisters, Daughters of Charity (with their big totals but median ages of 77+), have disappeared from the scene.