Penguins on the beach
Aug. 7th, 2004 12:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jawnbcIt was always a big deal when the nuns arrived. Da’s younger sister Eileen (OK one of his 4 younger sisters, plus one older, plus 2 younger brothers) surprised everyone when she announced her vocation at 19. Eileen was the brassy one: neighbourhood ring leader, intimidated by no one (not even Pop, who intimidated Da until just before he died). But she was called, and she entered the (wait for it) Sisters of Saint Dorothy in Rhode Island. The Dorothians are a teaching order, and their claim to fame is that the surviving Fatima child is a member--though she’s been shipped off to the Carmelites to avoid the faitherazzi.
For Catholic kids, having relatives that are clergy is a bonus--especially if they’re an aunt or uncle. It’s impossible to view priests and nuns as mysterious when you’ve seen them arguing with your Da over who was their mother’s favourite. I was never afraid of nuns or priest, nor police officers (we’ve a lot of those in the family). I never thought religious people had a direct line to Gawd, or that their perspective or insight was better than mine. I’d seen them with corn-on-the-cob goo on their chins. I’d seen them sneaking cigarettes with their sisters. I’d seen them bodysurfing.
Yes, bodysurfing. For a week every August the nuns would drive down from Rhode Island (cold, cold water) to Rockaway (kinda warm water) to be Less Nunlike. They’d pull up in their practical, beige sedan, park the car (Aunt E still drives like a NYer), and race up the front porch stairs in their post Vatican II habits (can’t run in the Old Skool habit without falling over), and reappear in minutes in their 1950s-style bathing suits. We’re talking hideous floral prints, with big frills things around the waist and industrially padded boob straps. I think they were donated to the order by some inebriated circus clowns . . .
The nuns--Aunt Eileen, her “particular friendship” Sr. Keegan, and any number of other nuns (a rotating cast)--would verily skip to the beach, chairs, towels and boogy boards in hand. They’d be splashing in the water most of the day. They weren’t trashy but they weren’t terribly nun-like either, aside from the odd “Gawd bless” tacked on to their sentences. They were fun. They were nice. Dare I say it, they were kewl.
Today, while I don’t doubt my aunt’s faith, I also wonder how much of her decision to enter religious life wasn’t strategic. Aunt Eileen’s brilliant (2 masters degrees) and ended being the Mother General for the Dorothians: the Mother General is the national Mother Superior. She taught, principalled and superintended schools in NY and Rhode Island. She learned a fair bit of Portuguese (the Mother house is in Portugal) and Spanish. Her life has been focused as much on learning (as a teacher and student) as anything else. For a smarty, sassy 19 year old woman in the Bronx in 1956, in a family of 8 kids with no money for university, it makes a for a compelling choice.
As for Aunt Eileen’s sexuality, I’ve not a clue. I would be surprised if she’s not kept her vow of chastity with men or women--she’s all about credibility. I do think her frienships have been sustaining and nurturing for her. I’m not terribly concerned with categorizations or labels--I’m just glad to know she’s been loved her whole life. Including by her former students. I’ve always had the sense she’s one of those teachers who busted your chops but did everything to help you learn if you were willing to the work. Not unlike myself.
Doing queer activism means dealing a lot with the damage done by organized religion to folks--individually and collectively. Aunt Eileen’s been very open to discussing my work. What’s clear to me now is that The Church is very much different with respect to gender. Nuns have focussed much more on the mission of Christ: service, care, love, justice. It’s the male-dominated hierarchy that’s toed the hardline about sexuality and gender. I find religious women often rock.
And surf. For the record, Aunt Eileen can cut the curls with the best of ‘em.
For Catholic kids, having relatives that are clergy is a bonus--especially if they’re an aunt or uncle. It’s impossible to view priests and nuns as mysterious when you’ve seen them arguing with your Da over who was their mother’s favourite. I was never afraid of nuns or priest, nor police officers (we’ve a lot of those in the family). I never thought religious people had a direct line to Gawd, or that their perspective or insight was better than mine. I’d seen them with corn-on-the-cob goo on their chins. I’d seen them sneaking cigarettes with their sisters. I’d seen them bodysurfing.
Yes, bodysurfing. For a week every August the nuns would drive down from Rhode Island (cold, cold water) to Rockaway (kinda warm water) to be Less Nunlike. They’d pull up in their practical, beige sedan, park the car (Aunt E still drives like a NYer), and race up the front porch stairs in their post Vatican II habits (can’t run in the Old Skool habit without falling over), and reappear in minutes in their 1950s-style bathing suits. We’re talking hideous floral prints, with big frills things around the waist and industrially padded boob straps. I think they were donated to the order by some inebriated circus clowns . . .
The nuns--Aunt Eileen, her “particular friendship” Sr. Keegan, and any number of other nuns (a rotating cast)--would verily skip to the beach, chairs, towels and boogy boards in hand. They’d be splashing in the water most of the day. They weren’t trashy but they weren’t terribly nun-like either, aside from the odd “Gawd bless” tacked on to their sentences. They were fun. They were nice. Dare I say it, they were kewl.
Today, while I don’t doubt my aunt’s faith, I also wonder how much of her decision to enter religious life wasn’t strategic. Aunt Eileen’s brilliant (2 masters degrees) and ended being the Mother General for the Dorothians: the Mother General is the national Mother Superior. She taught, principalled and superintended schools in NY and Rhode Island. She learned a fair bit of Portuguese (the Mother house is in Portugal) and Spanish. Her life has been focused as much on learning (as a teacher and student) as anything else. For a smarty, sassy 19 year old woman in the Bronx in 1956, in a family of 8 kids with no money for university, it makes a for a compelling choice.
As for Aunt Eileen’s sexuality, I’ve not a clue. I would be surprised if she’s not kept her vow of chastity with men or women--she’s all about credibility. I do think her frienships have been sustaining and nurturing for her. I’m not terribly concerned with categorizations or labels--I’m just glad to know she’s been loved her whole life. Including by her former students. I’ve always had the sense she’s one of those teachers who busted your chops but did everything to help you learn if you were willing to the work. Not unlike myself.
Doing queer activism means dealing a lot with the damage done by organized religion to folks--individually and collectively. Aunt Eileen’s been very open to discussing my work. What’s clear to me now is that The Church is very much different with respect to gender. Nuns have focussed much more on the mission of Christ: service, care, love, justice. It’s the male-dominated hierarchy that’s toed the hardline about sexuality and gender. I find religious women often rock.
And surf. For the record, Aunt Eileen can cut the curls with the best of ‘em.
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no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 06:54 am (UTC)THANKS! :-)
no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 05:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 07:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 05:57 pm (UTC)On a bizarre side note: anyone with Down's syndrome your family? Religious folks and DS kids seem to be very common in Irish families.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 06:17 pm (UTC)Not exactly fairy penguins, I bet.
Date: 2004-08-07 10:31 am (UTC)Lovely stuff. xxx T.
Re: Not exactly fairy penguins, I bet.
Date: 2004-08-07 05:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 03:19 pm (UTC)How funny I should read your post the day after I watched the movie The Magdalene Sisters.
I have had similar happy recollections of nuns in the family life, both in and out of mufti, let alone muff. While none of my more immediate family members were called, my aunt having taught in a number of parish schools ensured a large number of Dominicans scurrying about her home and her pool. Especially shocking was the year the Dominicans went from full kit to shorter skirts, a result of Vatican II modernizations. Shocking, thoroughly shocking to a child of my sensibilities.
I never had any problems with nuns, though my sister hates them all thoroughly, irrationally, because of how miserable some of them made her. It makes me question what part of the difficulties that "recovering" Catholics claim are gendered, and whether these problems would have occurred in any same sex institution. Frankly, as bright as your aunt might be, I wonder if she felt in anyway stifled by joining orders. As liberating as the order might be in providing her an education and a chance to excel, does it not also restrict her, is this the only option available to her? I can remember some not very kind nuns from my early grade school years and I can't help but wonder if they might have been more ,well, pleasant, had other opportunities been available to them.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 05:59 pm (UTC)Go raibh maith agat.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-07 09:01 pm (UTC)And every sister I knew had at least one MA or MEd
no subject
Date: 2004-08-08 12:16 am (UTC)You're....not....a man....of God! You're....not....a man....of God!You're....not....a man....of God!You're....not....a man....of God!You're....not....a man....of God!
no subject
Date: 2004-08-08 07:32 am (UTC)The line is lifted directly from one young woman's experience. Hell, the whole documentary has direct precedent in the documentary.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-09 05:08 am (UTC)Why should I see nuns - who may not be holding the guns but devote their lives to supporting the organization that does - as any different?
no subject
Date: 2004-08-09 05:15 am (UTC)Agree with? Quite often not. But whatever her values, she backs them up with important and unconditional work--not empty rhetoric or proselytizing.
I don't disagree with point btw; there are hateful nuns. She's not one of them.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-09 07:00 am (UTC)You said:
"Doing queer activism means dealing a lot with the damage done by organized religion to folks--individually and collectively. Aunt Eileen’s been very open to discussing my work. What’s clear to me now is that The Church is very much different with respect to gender. Nuns have focussed much more on the mission of Christ: service, care, love, justice. It’s the male-dominated hierarchy that’s toed the hardline about sexuality and gender. I find religious women often rock."
I believe that no matter how good your aunt is, or how good her works are, that her participation and support of the organization she belongs to that is actively damaging to gay people makes her culpable for that damage.
Lots of people do very good work, devote their lives to service to others, without supporting a hateful organization in the process.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-09 05:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-09 08:45 pm (UTC)