Nuns in the Episcopal Church?
One of the nicest things to come my way over the past year has been the opportunity to visit the Sisters of St. Mary at their new convent at the Spiritual Life Center in Greenwich, New York. Last fall I was invited to give a series of lectures on the Creed to the sisters. As I returned month by month, a relationship developed and I was asked to serve as the Provincial Chaplain for the community. In this capacity, in addition to my continuing role as lecturer, I officiate at some of their services and meet with the nuns who wish to speak with me for counsel or to make their confessions. These visits have become the spiritual high point of my month.
Why would anyone become a nun?
When I tell people about my time at the convent, they are often puzzled. “I didn’t know there were nuns in the Episcopal Church!” they say. In fact there are a fair number of Episcopal convents and monasteries in the United States and throughout world-wide Anglicanism. Inevitably, comes the question “Are they allowed to get married?” The answer, of course, is that they have chosen not to get married; this is what being a monk or a nun is all about. Men and women who have been called to a religious order have explicitly chosen vows of celibacy and self-dedication to God in place of marriage. The next question is never openly stated but is clearly on people’s minds: “Why would anyone do such a thing?” For many people—even in the church—the idea that a normal person would opt for celibacy in place of family life and sexual intimacy seems incomprehensible.
For those called to this way of life, the element of renunciation is not onerous; it is a means of gaining spiritual freedom. To choose such a life is not to suggest that sexuality or family life is morally tarnished or unholy. It is merely a way radically to simplify one’s life and attain a whole-hearted dependence on God. It is hardly a lonely existence. Monastic life is deeply communal; the members of an order become a new sort of family, much like the disciples who gathered abound Jesus.
A Catholic Thing?
Many people think of nuns as a “Catholic thing,” a unique feature of the Roman Catholic Church that distinguishes it from other Christian churches. But the practice of monasticism is not restricted to Roman Catholicism. There have always been communities of monks and nuns in Eastern Orthodox Christianity. The nineteenth century saw a revival of monasticism within Anglicanism, and there are even a few Lutheran and Reformed communities in Europe, most notably the ecumenical community at Taizé in France. Monasticism is also a fixture of Hinduism and especially Buddhism.
A Brief History
Christian monasticism began in the fourth century as celibate communities of men and women formed in the deserts of Egypt and Palestine. In 313, Emperor Constantine issued the Edict of Milan, giving Christians unrestricted freedom to practice their religion. Within a century, Christianity was the official religion of the empire. It had become easy to be a Christian; the moral rigor of the early church was replaced by a mass religion that made far fewer demands on its adherents. The time of the martyrs was over. Yet some Christians were painfully aware of the disconnect between the demanding religion of Jesus in the Gospels and the established mass Christianity of the Empire. They began to seek what they referred to as the “white martyrdom” of a life totally devoted to renunciation and prayer.
In the sixth century, the monastic experiment in the East Mediterranean began to take root in western Europe. The most influential example was St. Benedict, whose Rule of Life established a standard pattern for monastic life that lasts to this day.
By the late middle ages, the monasteries were in need of reform. Martin Luther had been a monk for many years before renouncing his vows and marrying a nun named Catherine of Bora. Luther’s experience of monasticism was not happy and failed to resolve a spiritual crisis brought on by his recognition of his own sinfulness.
“Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience. I could not believe that He was placated by my satisfaction.”
For Luther, monasticism was an effort to be justified by “works of the law,” in which monks or nuns sought to earn merit and “placate God” by their good works. When Luther came to the Biblical insight that we are justified before God solely by His grace, received by faith, he renounced his vows and sought to live out his Christian vocation within the everydayness of family life.
Luther reminded the Church that family life is as fitting a setting for a life of holiness and obedience as the monastery. In recent times the church has come to recognize that Luther was correct; a monastic vocation is not necessarily any more “holy” than life in the market place or the family. What Luther did not seem to recognize is that God calls different people to different ways of life. For those whom God has called to a monastic community, the “religious life” provides a unique opportunity to live out the Gospel in imitation of Jesus and his closest followers.
In the mid-nineteenth century women and men in the Church of England and the Episcopal Church began to form religious communities similar to those in the Roman Catholic Church. The Community of St. Mary, founded by Mother Harriet (and four companions) in New York City in 1865, was the first of these communities in the United States. Since then a whole network of monastic orders have sprouted up and thrived in the Episcopal Church and across the Anglican Communion.
My Monthly Visit to the Convent
One Wednesday each month, I drive across the Adirondacks and arrive at St. Mary’s Convent in time to join the nuns as they chant the Psalms at Evening Prayer. The chapel is simple and understated. The walls are white and unadorned except for the Stations of the Cross that are recessed into the wall and the striking carved crucifix over the stone altar. The acoustics are wonderful, allowing the chanting to reverberate through the space with a sense of timeless transcendence. It is as if these simple melodies take the worshipper back to the beginning of history.
Evening Prayers ends with the ringing of the Angelus. As one of the novices rings the great bell on the hill outside the convent, the nuns silently recite a series of three “Hail Marys” punctuated by Bible verses announcing the incarnation of the Word made Flesh in Christ. This is classic “Anglo-Catholicism”—not exactly the “low church” wing of the Episcopal Church.
Dinner begins with a prayer and a Bible reading. We eat in silence. For visitors the silence can be awkward at first; but as one gets used to it, the simple act of eating becomes calm and mindful—almost like a prayer. One realizes how absent-mindedly we usually consume what is on our plate.
Not long after dinner, the nuns end their day by returning to the chapel for the night time Office of Compline. The community then maintains silence until after Morning Prayer the next day.
We are up at 6:30 for Morning Prayer and then the Eucharist. After a silent breakfast, I meet with Mother Miriam or one of the other nuns. Following a mid-morning service in the chapel I give my lecture at 10:00. These presentations are a unique challenge since my audience includes two young novices from Africa with minimal education, another novice with a graduate degree from Columbia, and a group of experienced nuns who have been reading the Scriptures and the Church Fathers for many years. Somehow, I must make my remarks accessible to the African sisters while also sufficiently engaging to the inquiring minds of the more educated American nuns! At noon we are back in the chapel to recite the Psalms before lunch, and then I am on my way back to the North Country.
Prayer and Work
The nuns spend a lot of time in church! Their life revolves around the regular services of the Daily Office (what Benedict called the Opus Dei or “work of God”). Chanted with a reflective dignity, the Daily Office centers on the recitation of the Psalms. These services make no concessions to the modern craving for novelty or excitement—quite the opposite of the sort of lively worship music that is often played at the Diocesan convention. And yet they have a way of drawing one into their calming rhythm.
When not in church or in their own private prayer, the sisters stay busy. One sister is a copy editor. A few of the nuns are active in Nigel Mumford’s healing ministry. Others tend chickens and goats, and one sister is a bee keeper. In addition there are the multitude of tasks in maintaining their own domestic life and taking care of the older sisters in the community.
For the Church and the World
One cannot spend much time in a convent or monastery without discovering that these communities do not exist merely for their own spiritual benefit; monist communities benefit the whole church. The Daily Office is the Church’s corporate prayer, recited on behalf of the whole church. The prayer life of the nuns is a continuous act of intercession for the church and the world—in this respect, the sisters are deeply connected to the world around them. Moreover, at the core of the Rule of St. Benedict is an emphasis on hospitality. Every monastery and convent receives guests. The Convent of St. Mary is typical; guests come and go all the time. They arrive seeking a place apart from their normal routine where they share in the worship and contemplation of nuns, and then take something of that back with them to their everyday lives. And for me, it remains a gift and privilege to have been invited to do just that each month.