know.”
She realized she was breaking Holy Rule again, and said, “Well... I must get back to the convent.”
________
Sister Regina was about thirty seconds shy of being late for Matins and Lauds. Mother Superior gave her a look of disapproval when she hurried into chapel short of breath from running to the convent from the back door of the church.
Within their own tiny chapel, with its feeling of refuge, she once again felt the angst of the day begin to slip away. Kneeling beside her sisters, in this place where she’d spent so many hours, falling into the familiar routine, she felt a reaffirmation that this was where she belonged. Their sweet soprano voices chanting in unison brought the assurance she so desired. During the Magnificat she felt transported, the Latin words flowing through her like fresh rain through dusty air, clearing and purifying.
During the thirty minutes of meditation, however, in the extreme silence of the airless chapel, all efforts to free her mind of temporal thoughts failed. The conversations with both Sister Dora and Mr. Olczak kept intruding, and by the time she went downstairs for supper she felt like an imposter in her habit. Surely a truly good nun would be able to achieve a union with God that would supersede all worldly thoughts.
But not she. Not she.
At supper Sister Gregory pushed her dish of apple pie aside, then nipped at it all through the meal until she’d eaten it all. Sister Samuel sneezed on everything in sight, and Sister Cecelia told Sister Agnes that she had seen Sister Regina leave the convent without her undersleeves on, and even though she was only going to clean the sacristy, it wasn’t proper.
During community hour Sister Mary Charles, fulfilling her charge, read a chapter from their Constitution. Sister Regina did not know whether it was by chance or by order of their Reverend Mother that tonight’s reading was the chapter on obedience.
Sister Mary Charles read:
Religious should have a great reverence for holy obedience and should strive earnestly to overcome every inclination to self-will.
On all occasions they should conform to the directions of their superior with a prompt, exact, and wholehearted response, and they should never censure the judgments of those who are in authority, believing that the will of God is manifested through them.
Sister Regina realized, upon hearing the rule read aloud, that not only since the death of Krystyna Olczak but for months before that she had broken her vow of obedience time and again. She had broken it by silently railing against the many constraints put upon her by Holy Rule and the Constitution. Even worse, she had begun assessing the methods used by the order to keep the nuns in line, and to consider them akin to brainwashing.
That night in her room, during the hour set aside for reflection, Sister Regina performed the required daily examen. Kneeling beside her bed, with her eyes closed and her hands folded, examining her conscience, she admitted that she had much for which to ask forgiveness, not only of God, but of her superior and her entire religious community as well.
CHAPTER SIX
Irene Pribil awakened on the Monday of her sister’s funeral in the same bedroom the two had shared as girls. It was a big south room with high ceilings and wide white woodwork in a farmhouse that had been built in 1880. The center of the floor was covered with linoleum—pink cabbage roses on a forest of green—that she dust mopped every Saturday during the regular weekly cleaning. Around the linoleum the edge of the floor was painted gray; she repainted it every April. The windows were hung with inexpensive white sheer panels that she helped her mother starch and hang on curtain stretchers every spring and every fall. Outside, east of the house, was the garden she helped her mother plant each spring and harvest each summer. And downstairs in the kitchen was the nickel-plated cast-iron stove, where they canned for
She realized she was breaking Holy Rule again, and said, “Well... I must get back to the convent.”
________
Sister Regina was about thirty seconds shy of being late for Matins and Lauds. Mother Superior gave her a look of disapproval when she hurried into chapel short of breath from running to the convent from the back door of the church.
Within their own tiny chapel, with its feeling of refuge, she once again felt the angst of the day begin to slip away. Kneeling beside her sisters, in this place where she’d spent so many hours, falling into the familiar routine, she felt a reaffirmation that this was where she belonged. Their sweet soprano voices chanting in unison brought the assurance she so desired. During the Magnificat she felt transported, the Latin words flowing through her like fresh rain through dusty air, clearing and purifying.
During the thirty minutes of meditation, however, in the extreme silence of the airless chapel, all efforts to free her mind of temporal thoughts failed. The conversations with both Sister Dora and Mr. Olczak kept intruding, and by the time she went downstairs for supper she felt like an imposter in her habit. Surely a truly good nun would be able to achieve a union with God that would supersede all worldly thoughts.
But not she. Not she.
At supper Sister Gregory pushed her dish of apple pie aside, then nipped at it all through the meal until she’d eaten it all. Sister Samuel sneezed on everything in sight, and Sister Cecelia told Sister Agnes that she had seen Sister Regina leave the convent without her undersleeves on, and even though she was only going to clean the sacristy, it wasn’t proper.
During community hour Sister Mary Charles, fulfilling her charge, read a chapter from their Constitution. Sister Regina did not know whether it was by chance or by order of their Reverend Mother that tonight’s reading was the chapter on obedience.
Sister Mary Charles read:
Religious should have a great reverence for holy obedience and should strive earnestly to overcome every inclination to self-will.
On all occasions they should conform to the directions of their superior with a prompt, exact, and wholehearted response, and they should never censure the judgments of those who are in authority, believing that the will of God is manifested through them.
Sister Regina realized, upon hearing the rule read aloud, that not only since the death of Krystyna Olczak but for months before that she had broken her vow of obedience time and again. She had broken it by silently railing against the many constraints put upon her by Holy Rule and the Constitution. Even worse, she had begun assessing the methods used by the order to keep the nuns in line, and to consider them akin to brainwashing.
That night in her room, during the hour set aside for reflection, Sister Regina performed the required daily examen. Kneeling beside her bed, with her eyes closed and her hands folded, examining her conscience, she admitted that she had much for which to ask forgiveness, not only of God, but of her superior and her entire religious community as well.
CHAPTER SIX
Irene Pribil awakened on the Monday of her sister’s funeral in the same bedroom the two had shared as girls. It was a big south room with high ceilings and wide white woodwork in a farmhouse that had been built in 1880. The center of the floor was covered with linoleum—pink cabbage roses on a forest of green—that she dust mopped every Saturday during the regular weekly cleaning. Around the linoleum the edge of the floor was painted gray; she repainted it every April. The windows were hung with inexpensive white sheer panels that she helped her mother starch and hang on curtain stretchers every spring and every fall. Outside, east of the house, was the garden she helped her mother plant each spring and harvest each summer. And downstairs in the kitchen was the nickel-plated cast-iron stove, where they canned for
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