"Sadly, the Martyrs always have a rough go of things," observes Sister Joan of Arc, as the Martyrs shout, "Our victory is in heaven!" Lady of Victory wins, followed by Cecilia.
And when they break into the three teams - Our Lady of Victory, Cecilia and the Martyrs - they scream and chant with a fierce competitiveness that is not all that, well, sisterly. They dribble and shoot in their long habits - the first-year postulates in black, the second-year novices in white. Now in her second year, she regularly drills her sisters on the court behind the convent. Sister Joan of Arc forsook law - but not basketball, entirely. But her plans shifted when she went on a medical mission trip: In Africa she saw abject physical poverty, but it was nothing compared with the impoverishment she saw when she came home. She says she worked on refugee issues after college, then received a scholarship to Notre Dame Law School. Sister Joan of Arc, who was born Kelsey Wicks, like the others here adopted a new name when she entered. At 6 feet, 2 inches, the former basketball player for the University of Notre Dame is hard to miss. Sister Joan of Arc, who's 27, stoops to pour coffee. The sisters eat breakfast in silence, sitting side by side at long tables, served by the novices in white habits and veils. She joined the Nashville Dominicans on her 22nd birthday. And I said, 'I think I'm supposed to enter soon.' And my father said, 'This is the time of life to take leaps.' " "My parents just sat there and looked at me," she says. Over Thanksgiving vacation in 2004, she broke the news to her family. In her junior year, she began feeling that God was drawing her to enter a convent. "I didn't know they still existed."Ĭlark, who is 27, says she became aware of the religious life when she was a student at Catholic University in Washington. "No," says Sister Beatrice Clark, laughing. Watching them, you wonder what would coax these young women to a strict life of prayer, teaching, study and silence. It is 5:30 in the morning, pitch black outside - but inside, the chapel is candescent as more than 150 women kneel and pray and fill the soaring sanctuary with their ghostly songs of praise.Ī few elderly sisters sit in wheelchairs, but most of these sisters have unlined faces and are bursting with energy. They enter the chapel without saying a word, the swish of their long white habits the only sound. Unlike many older sisters in previous generations, who wear street clothes and live alone, the Nashville Dominicans wear traditional habits and adhere to a strict life of prayer, teaching and silence. And overall, the average age of the Nashville Dominicans is 36 - four decades younger than the average nun nationwide. Cecilia are seeing a boom in new young sisters: Twenty-seven joined this year and 90 entered over the past five years. But something startling is happening in Nashville, Tenn. Convents are closing, nuns are aging and there are relatively few new recruits.
From left: Sister Cecelia Rose Pham, Sister Joan of Arc, Sister Victoria Marie Liederbach, Sister Mara Rose McDonnell and Sister Paula Marie Koffi.įor the most part, these are grim days for Catholic nuns. Now in her second year at the convent, she regularly plays ball with the sisters. Sister Joan of Arc (second from left) forsook law school but not basketball.
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