#ThisNunsStory Pt 1. I’m a cradle Catholic & grew up in a lively parish in NW England where I played guitar at Mass from age 7 & attended Catholic schools. My Dad was a Eucharistic Minister & I sometimes went with him to visit the sick. But I never thought about becoming a nun.
As a normal teenager my life was dominated by @takethat (including queuing for 4 hrs in the rain to meet them!), #Britpop, @LFC & @WarringtonRLFC. I still went to weekly Mass but in all honesty prayer & going to church was not top of my agenda during my early-mid teens.
There were no religious communities in my local area & I didn’t have any contact with nuns during childhood. In my late teens I went on a few youth retreats run by the Sacred Heart Fathers & began to develop a personal relationship with Jesus. My faith became my own.
The mid-90s was a great time to reach adulthood; so many opportunities! I came from a working class background but believed I could become anything I wanted. I did well at school in most subjects & when it came to applying for university I had no idea what I wanted to do.
I was attracted to teaching but didn’t want to narrow my options too much at that point. I chose a broad course, Business Operation & Control, which had aspects of all the subjects I'd studied for A Level: Maths, Psychology & Economics as well as IT, leaving career options open.
During my 1st year at @SalfordUni I got involved with the Catholic Chaplaincy, again playing guitar at Mass but also spending time daily at the Chaplaincy on campus. I made lifelong friends & my prayer life deepened. I bought myself a rosary & bible & began attending daily Mass.
In August 1997, we travelled to Paris for #WYD with Pope St John Paul II. The theme that year was “Master, where do you live? Come and see.” (John 1:38-39) I took this as a personal invitation to grow closer to Jesus in my daily life. More tomorrow!
#ThisNunsStory Pt 2. While in France for #WYD I also visited #Lisieux. Until then I knew very little about St Thérèse & even less about this strange word ‘Carmel’ even though I’d attended @CarmelCollege! I’d heard of Mount Carmel but assumed it was a Marian shrine like Lourdes 🤦♀️
Some of my friends were devotees of St Thérèse and encouraged me to get to know her. I bought a copy of her autobiography The Story of a Soul but strangely it didn’t make a significant impression the first time I read it, except that I was glad to know more about her.
In Lisieux we prayed for the friend of a friend who'd just entered Carmel in the UK (in fact the community I entered later.) I found it fascinating that someone our age could be called to this way of life & that it even existed in the UK. But I never imagined that it was for me.
During #WYD we’d seen lots of nuns & the idea first popped into my head that I could be called to religious life. I dismissed it quickly & with a sense of disloyalty as I had a boyfriend. We’d met at a youth retreat 2 years earlier & hoped to marry after I finished uni.
For my 2nd year I moved into the Chaplaincy house. Among my housemates were one friend who hoped to begin seminary the next year & another who hoped to enter the Daughters of Charity. They were ordinary people & it made me realise God can call anyone.
The early months of ’98 were a real turning point. First, I broke up with my boyfriend after realising I felt trapped and unhappy, not wanting to spend the rest of my life with him. I knew I’d made the right decision but it was still painful & took a lot of courage.
I then began to feel disillusioned with my uni course which seemed to be all about making money & exploiting people. I stuck with it but couldn’t reconcile it with my deepening Christian faith & felt called instead to do something to help people. More tomorrow!
#ThisNunsStory Pt 3: Around this time some friends were going to the Carmelite monastery I eventually entered & I went along for the ride. I had no desire for this way of life & remember thinking the nuns must get so bored just sitting in their cells praying all day. [🙃I wish!]
I was due to take a year’s industrial placement but thought of skipping it to finish my degree quicker. Thankfully, some good friends changed my mind & I got a placement working for ICL, mostly involving web design & maintenance. I loved it & it taught me skills I still use now.
The thought of religious life kept recurring and I kept pushing it away. I prayed that I might know God’s will for my life but was adding, as if in small print, “As long as I don’t have to be a nun!” I soon realised that God doesn’t read the small print.
Just before I began my work placement I attended the wedding of 2 friends. Our chaplain was preaching about the love of the bride & groom for each other & how it meant they were always present to each other. I looked up and my eyes met a statue of the Sacred Heart.
This was the bombshell moment when I realised Jesus had become the most important person in my life & that he was calling me to spend my life with him. I still didn’t want to admit that this might mean a call to religious life. I continued to pray for guidance. More tomorrow!
#ThisNunsStory Pt 4: At the chaplaincy I found a vocations pamphlet from a Carmelite monastery. It began with the challenge of the Prophet Elijah: “Why are you halting between two ways? If the Lord is God, follow him!” (1 Kings 18:21)
The same day I came across some words of St Teresa of Avila from her Life: “On the one hand God was calling me; on the other I was following the world. All the things of God made me happy; those of the world held me bound. It seems to me I was trying to reconcile these 2 things."
Both these quotations seemed to speak so directly to my experience that they were the final prod I needed to give in to God & say OK, maybe I might have a vocation to religious life! I confided in my best friend who was delighted & he gave me courage to see our chaplain about it.
Father was unsurprised & said: ”I was wondering when you were going to get around to that!” It was as though everyone could see it but me! Our conversation brought me a deep sense of peace, joy & acceptance. I realised how much I'd been struggling & now I felt free & happy.
An important question he asked was what I meant by "a vocation to religious life?" I said I felt God was calling me to a life of prayer, centred on the Eucharist, lived both in solitude & community. This seemed to point to Carmel but I knew I needed to explore it further.
The next day at Mass the reading was from Hosea (2:16-22) and I’d never heard it before: “I am going to lure her & lead her out into the wilderness & speak to her heart….I will betroth you to myself for ever….& you shall come to know the Lord.” I shed a tear or two!
I’d met a lot of wonderful apostolic religious sisters but felt more drawn to contemplative life. I think my attraction to Carmelite spirituality was a big part of this. I also believed that through a life of prayer I could be of help to everyone in need. More tomorrow!
#ThisNunsStory Pt 5: I wanted to see through my university course so took my time before contacting any religious communities. I continued living at the Chaplaincy & completed my work placement then my final year at uni. I also attended another #WYD in 2000 in Rome.
I was reading a lot from the Carmelite saints: Thérèse, Elizabeth & the poetry of John of the Cross. I found St Teresa difficult at first and it took me several years to grow to love and understand her. Reading her Foundations and letters really helped with this.
During my final year I made some weekend visits to Carmel, staying in the monastery extern quarters. I encountered a joyful community & felt deeply attracted to their life of prayer, spent mostly in solitude. I also visited other religious Orders but did not feel the same pull.
After graduation, instead of applying for graduate jobs I worked as an office temp, which gave me full-time work but also extra freedom to explore my vocation. The next step would be to arrange a live-in, a longer stay at Carmel inside the enclosure.
6 months after graduation I was offered a longer term job by @SalfordDiocese which I accepted and kept until I entered Carmel. I was still living at the Chaplaincy & was able to work from home, before it was fashionable! In August 2001 I went to live-in at Carmel for 2 weeks.
Life inside the enclosure was very different to my expectations. I never imagined Carmelite life would be so busy! But underpinning all the movement between work, choir & cell was a deep stillness, presence & joy. I felt it was what our Lord meant by living life to the full.
I was struck by the simplicity of lifestyle, the silence, the starkness of my Carmelite cell, the joys to be found in simple things like sharing chocolates at recreation. My mind was made up & I knew I wanted to enter & thankfully my community accepted me. Final part tomorrow!
#ThisNunsStory Pt 6: My parents were supportive but hoped it was a phase I'd grow out of. Over time, when they saw my happiness, it made them happy too. When we enter a religious order we ask a lot of our parents & I’ll always be grateful for their sacrifice and generosity.
I did a further, shorter live-in just before Christmas and set a date to enter in June 2002. Beforehand I fulfilled a life ambition (v. important before entering an enclosed monastery) of making a pilgrimage to Lourdes. I also had a last holiday with my brother & sister-in-law.
My future novice mistress had given me the great advice: “Don’t try to live as a nun before you are one.” Prayer was central in my life but I also continued socialising with family or friends every weekend, going to concerts, theatre, cinema & of course watching @LFC.
You might ask if I miss all that, now that I’m an enclosed nun. Honest answer: sometimes. But I’ve also found that God gives the ‘hundredfold’ in so many unexpected and delightful ways.
On entering, the biggest culture shock was the silence & the lack of instant communication. This actually allows for a deepening of relationships with family & friends but it takes time. Another shock was the struggles in community life. I think I expected the nuns to be perfect!
Of course, entering was just the beginning of the real discernment process & that journey of learning, growth, ups & downs did not stop at Solemn Profession either & never will. Religious life, like any life, is an adventure & every day brings new joys & challenges.
It’s often said of religious life that we enter for one reason and stay for another. We grow, as does our way of life and charism over time & our response has to adapt to the needs of the moment. But that relationship of love with Jesus which led me to Carmel will always remain.
Thanks to all who have read and responded to these tweets with such lovely comments. I now hand on the #ThisNunsStory baton to @Silvanarscj
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