According to The New York Times, there is a surge in the number of women deciding to enter into religious institutions, from seven in 2014 to about forty-five in 2016; yet, when I told my best friends that I was considering entering the convent, they were astonished.
I am a product of the current generation and religion has never been a huge part of being a Millennial. Most of my peers have rejected the institution of religion for other more “spiritual” practices, or chosen to believe that science can explain everything away. Compared to the generation before us, Millennials are much less likely to associate with any religious traditions at all, one in four adults identifying as “unaffiliated” being a marker of this.
Even so, more and more young people, particularly young women, are choosing to enter into contemplative life. According to The National Office for Vocation of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of England and Wales, this is primarily due to the dissatisfaction that today’s young women have with modern society.
Agriculture is more productive than it ever has been, machines have reduced the amount of physical labor needed, the prevalence of many diseases has decreased, and yet many still find uneasiness in the modern world of fast moving cars and loud stock brokers.
Sociologist Patricia Wittberg believes that the return to tradition can also be seen in a shift in values from the social justice and volunteering of past generations to the spirituality and doctrinal orthodoxy of young sisters today. While older sisters were all about following rules, young sisters prefer the spiritual connections built through a life of poverty, obedience, and chastity.
Religious institutions know that the times have changed and that the vow of obedience, poverty and chastity, forgoing the possibility for marriage and children, is difficult for most people to understand. To appear more inviting, many orders have taken to technology. Sister Helena Burns from the Daughters of St. Paul is active on Instagram, where she posts interesting pictures of her ministries and the people she has met, and even utilizes famous memes to make important points. Many young nuns are also diving into blogging their experiences, including Sister Tracy Kemme, who wrote about her experience of becoming a Catholic nun through her blog “Diary of a Sister-in-Training”. This is a way for nuns to become more well-known in the world, no longer secrets hidden behind those steel bars, but out in the open and ready for action.
Becoming a nun as a Millennial is very different now than it was back then when many of the older sisters took their vows. Today’s young women have student loans to pay off, usually over $20,000 of debt, and while congregations hope to allow these women to follow their callings, sometimes it isn’t always possible. The age of technology, while allowing convents to reach out to prospective women, also hinders the ability for a woman to truly devote herself to a life of reflection and prayer.
And, most Millennial discerners, such as myself, encounter significant backlash for their decisions to explore religious life. Although it is becoming increasingly more popular, people don’t want to talk about it. Religion has become a political hot topic that often makes people upset and uncomfortable, and to find that someone of our current politically activist-based and feminist society is considering a consecrated life with God is beyond most people’s comprehension.
Whether a person is from one generation or another, the choice to become a nun is ultimately about a love for God and a dedication to do God’s work, and although married life is enticing to many discerners, sometimes that is just not compelling enough. The decision to become a sister is a long and sometimes brutal process, but more women of the Millennial generation are finding that it fulfills a purpose inside them that they never knew they had. So, while the world continues to promote self-destructive activities, the convents of the world will be working to quietly put it back together.
