Unveiled Nuns Talking Author:Mary Loudon When Mary Loudon was eighteen she fell in love -- to her astonishment -- with a priest. Unable to accept what he had chosen to do with his life, she was told to go and talk to a local nun, who would help her. Mary was skeptical, but as she grew to know this woman better, she found all her prejudices and ill-conceived notions about nu... more »ns turned upside down, and her curiosity was aroused.
From these unlikely beginnings grew this unusal collection of fascinating autobiogrpahies, where Mary Loudon gives nuns from varying backgrounds, orders and beliefs a chance to speak openly and uninhibitedly about themselves and their lives. Her questions are sharp, sympathetic and challenging -- those of an outsider who has managed to achieve unique access to a world about which we know little -- and the stories of these ten women are moving, bizarre and sometimes shocking.
These women are as different as ten people could be. They range in age from thirty-five to seventy-six, and while some live lives of strict enclosure, others have jobs, among them an AIDS counsellor, a nurse, a writer and broadcaster, a silversmith, a foster mother. In their own words they offer an enormous variety of feelings and opinions on why women become nuns and what it means to be a nun today.« less