Reply #5: Oh my . . .

[patrice]

She said women religious have been virtually unanimous in spirit that they have been living out their missions, as directed by the gospels and by the Second Vatican Council, which called upon religious communities to go out in the world to work among the poor and to build more just and peaceful structures.

She explained that in the process church prelates lost the control over women religious congregations they once had. She said many women religious believe the investigation is part of an effort to regain that control.

"Vatican II took us out of the ghettos and into ecology, feminism and justice in the world," she said. "The Vatican still has a difficult time accepting that."

Some of the women interviewed by NCR cite an irony involved in the investigation. One said that it is "unlikely the Vatican wanted us to come out of this being more confident of our identity as self-defining religious agents, but that is exactly what has happened.

I know women are second class Catholics, but I always thought nuns had somekind of authority within "the Church" - didn't know this:

Several women said canon lawyers told the women they were not required to answer all the questions. Religious, unlike bishops, priests and deacons, who make up the clergy, are not officially part of the church's hierarchical structure. According to this reasoning, women religious are responsible to their congregation leadership and to their constitutions.

Nuns get a bad rap in popular culture.

I was schooled by nuns through the 10th grade. There were some neurotics, but no more than the general population. They were stern creatures not given to flattery and there were some whom I can credit with awakening my love of literature and my appreciation of critical thinking and logic.

Odd I should happen across this today as I had a conversation on another blog earlier where some women are discussing religion in general and how messed up everything is and they made statements about the strong NEED for women in secular environments to step forward and accept the responsibilities of power.