There's something I've been wondering for some time.
What is it about these
I mean, look at this pic. Guess, without looking, which one is Sr. Margaret McBride, RSM, the head of a Phoenix Catholic hospital that did an abortion recently?
Didja guess the one on the right? Is it because the one on the left looks kind of like a normal person? The lady in red not unpleasant enough? Doesn't have that special something that says "angry feminist with agenda"?
I scared a priest friend of mine once when I did my anti-nun impression. He had been through the sem with one of these trolls as gatekeeper. Seminarians learn fast, if they get through, to make the right noises with these "pastoral associate" fembots.
They all talk the same way; they're trained to do it in their hugging-your-inner-tree workshops. It's a kind of schizophrenically even-toned, low pitched drone, just above a whisper, executed leaning forward on the elbows, chin tilted slightly down while making constant eye-contact. I did it in the pub, and Fr. D____ actually physically jerked back in his seat away from me.
Anyway, what I wonder is why all these...um...women, look like that. It's not the age. I realise they are all of a particular generation, but I've seen good looking 60 year-olds. Lots.
I wonder if it's something to do with the peculiar nunnish version of femmo-fascism, that seems particularly averse to femininity in appearance and manner. The look is unmistakable.
There's a thing in Rome with the nuns. There are a lot of nuns running around. A lot of them wear habits (or at least those kind of polyester cleaning-lady outfits). But you can always tell the habitless angry American anti-nuns on the buses and in the piazza, even if they don't open their mouths. It could be that no woman in real life would ever dress so badly. The doubleknit blazer and skirt, white polyester blouse worn with sneakers...Yi!
But it's the air of them that is really the distinctive thing, whatever it is. It's so strong that you can spot it 50 yards away. They just radiate something bad.
A kind of petty, small-minded evil.
Sorry. I just realised that wasn't very nice. Maybe I'm just in a bad mood.
~
10 comments:
Dear Hilary Jane:
I read both your blog and the article you gave the link to, and I agree, "Sister" Margaret McBride behaved abominably and richly deserved the automatic excommunication. She is CAST out until if and when she repents. To those who don't know, excommunication is meant to be both penal and medicinal. That is, it is hoped the shock of excommunication will help bring the sinner to a change of mind and heart.
And Dr. Paul A. Byrne's explanaion of why pulmonary hypertension does not even offer a poor, false excuse for abortion was quite convincing. I was reminded of how, even a century ago, the article on abortion in the 1911 ENCYOPAEDIA BRITANNICA denied there was any medical excuse for abortions. But,then, most drs. still believed in the Hippocratic oath.
Sincerely, Sean
That was delicious, and very timely. I was about to abandon your blog (after its turn to niceness and pictures) in search, elsewhere, of a regular shot of incisive and droll snark about Catholic lunacy, but now all is restored. Thank you.
By the way, my theory about why these nuns dress so horribly is that they have mistakenly conflated the 'vow of poverty' with some unfounded notion of 'simplicity,' which is just an ideological disguise for their hatred of beauty. If the three transcendentals stand or fall together, then these nuns obvious hatred for the truth is also a concomitant hatred of the good and the beautiful.
Oh, dear. Shame about the niceness. Can't fault the accuracy, though. Full marks.
In fact, what you say is so much of a given that it's become a byword in this household. On occasion Someone will say to me, "Look at her. She needs to do something with herself. She dresses like a nun." And she's not referring to wimples, veils, and scapulars, either.
Or She will whisper to me, "I'll betcha anything she's a nun." And no matter how many are present, I know exactly who she means. Grown-out military haircut, dumpy, ill-fitting clothes, and possibly a pin of some sort which may have had religious significance in another life. (Verbs for all comments will be supplied upon request.)
Cheers,
-John-
A kind of petty, small-minded evil.
Yes. They revel in destruction, but it's mostly destruction of small, unimportant - but beautiful - things. Destroy enough little things though and you've done quite a lot. - Karen
No, not terribly nice. TERRIBLY accurate, though! You are a journalist, and that's the important thing.
If you worked for a Catholic institution under one of these harridans, she would stake you through the heart and dump you in a ditch, and the day after, not even remember that she had done so.
Kum-ba-f***ing-ya!
Actually, the real bargains at the Goodwill are found in piles where they sell the clothes by weight.
Plus the woman on the left has a nice hairdo.
The newnun involves eschewing the elegance of the traditional religious habit without adopting secular elegance. Not one nor the other.
But some nuns are not quite so in your face, and this can make trouble for laywomen.
Like this woman whom I know, devout, non-stylish and wears a large cross round her neck. She's doing the shops when someone sidles up and asks, "Are you a sister?"
I used to get asked quite regularly if I were a nun. Then I got a better job and started shopping more.
'Being nice' is part of the reason why we're in such trouble in the Church!
Please continue to be accurate, fair and above all, truthful; leave 'nice' to the 'God loves you as you are=you don't need conversion junkies.
How terribly mean!
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