Posted on 09/04/2009 8:13:41 AM PDT by NYer
Churches and whole dioceses have left the Episcopal Church since the 2003 consecretation of an openly gay bishop brought a lonstanding divide over homosexuality within the nation's sixth-largest Protestant denomination out into the open.
But on Thursday, 10 Episcopal nuns from a Catonsville convent took what scholars say is the unprecedented step of joining the Catholic Church. At a Mass celebrated by Archbishop Edwin F. O'Brien, each vowed to continue their tradition of consecrated life, now as a religious institute within the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
"We know our beliefs and where we are," Mother Christina Christie, superior of All Saints Sisters of the Poor, told sun colleague Mary Gail Hare. "We were drifting farther apart from the more liberal road the Episcopal Church is traveling. We are now more at home in the Roman Catholic Church."
In a statement, Bishop Eugene Taylor Sutton of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland wished them God's blessings.
"Despite the sadness we feel in having to say farewell, our mutual joy is that we remain as one spiritual family of faith, one body in Christ," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at weblogs.baltimoresun.com ...
Welcome home, Sisters!
Ping!
I was a lifelong Episcopalian, even a senior warden, but the church left me.
Before I married, I had a girlfriend, also Episcopalian.
She left the church and became a nun in the Catholic church.
nOW THOSE ARE NUNS-—What is Sr. Joan Chittister doing these days? MAybe she should go join the Episcopal Church!
Bless these nuns!
When I was a kid we had nuns and called then Zeros (none - get it?). we thought our hoodlum selves was clever.
I have met a few of the nuns, who rememberbed me as a good kid. I have alwasy thanked them for their service.
It is sad that my kis did not have a single nun or brother in their school.
A life devoted to service. What could be better?
well don't I feel like the stooopid one... here i always thought Nuns were a Catholic thing. learn something new everyday
Yes, Episcopalians always had nuns. When I was a kid you could tell them apart because mostly the Epicopalian nuns wore dark blue habits while the Catholics wore black, brown, or white habits. Now, it’s hard to tell because most Catholics don’t wear habits at all.
I meant to add, welcome to thise sisters and to their chaplain. God Bless you all, and may your 2 recalcitrant sisters be enlightened by your example and join you in spirit some day — even though you are all still joined in your work.
Wow ... thank you for sharing this. That is quite a story. Do you stay in touch with her?
interesting... and i don't agree with the street clothes thing at all, they should wear a habit
The good sister second from right bears such a close resemblance to my fifth grade teacher that it's scary. Same stern "don't mess with me" look, too. Yikes!!
Yep, its how all religous sisters should dress.
Yes!
And I remember going to one of my kid’s classes in 1965 and the Nun wearing a mini-skirt.
Wait! Wait! That IS your fifth grade teacher!
Hooray! The Church will benefit from these new members. It looks like they brook no nonsense!
This is funny, in an interesting sort of way.
Back when the Episcopalians set their feet firmly on the downward path at General Convention 2003, we set about looking for a new church home.
At the time Rev. Tanghe was rector of Our Saviour Virginia-Highlands, the ultramontane High Anglican church in Atlanta. As we were "visiting around", we hit his church on the day of its annual meeting and were invited to sit in. They were debating whether to stay in ECUSA, join the Southern Cone Anglicans (the breakaway Piskies who placed themselves under the Bishop of Argentina), or Go Straight Over to Rome. Ultimately they decided to stay, but the bishop is sabotaging them and I do not think the parish will survive long. The bish actually had a spy in the rector's office, but that's another story.
We had a long talk with Rev. Tanghe, and I corresponded with him a good deal. I sent him a DVD of the Anglican Use Rite service at one of the Catholic churches in Texas, and he wrote back that he had decided to stay with the Episcopalians. About a year later I heard he had resigned his living to go be chaplain to this convent. About three months ago I heard that the sisters were contemplating this step, and that he was too.
I guess the Hound of Heaven was not going to be denied . . . .
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