Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Nuns on the up
The number of women becoming nuns in England and Wales has trebled over the past five years. Before you get too excited about this news, the numerical increase was from 15 to 45. Of course, these figures don’t include women who secretly become nuns without telling the church. There must be many thousands who wear the wimple at private events in hotels and taverns.
Ignorant people who think that women become nuns because they are too unattractive to have sex should study the case of Theodora Hawksley (pictured above). This 29-year-old postdoctoral researcher mystified her friends by giving up her academic career to join a nunnery in North London.
“In one sense it is a bit like trying to explain to somebody why you are marrying the person you are,” explained Theodora. “You can list their qualities, but in the end it is a relationship of love.”
When I showed her picture to the manager of the safari camp, his breathing quickened.
“What would I have to do to kiss this woman on the lips?” he asked.
“You could start by changing your name to Jesus Christ,” I replied. “Then perform a few miracles, rise from the dead, and her tongue will be wrestling with your tonsils in no time.”
“Bah!” grunted the manager. “I was hoping taking her up The Shard might do the trick.”
Theodora is joining an order of nuns called ‘The Congregation of Jesus’, which encourages its daughters to discard the traditional habit in favour of a t-shirt and jeans. This makes it easier for them to mingle with the ungodly, but harder for the men they meet in discotheques and bars to know they are unavailable. The only solution I can think of is printing “Girlfriend of God” or “Wholly Virgin” on their t-shirts. Being upfront about your situation is better than planting booby-traps on your body, like Catherine de Medici.
Now Theodora, at the age of 29, might not be wholly or even partially a virgin. This possibility we must bravely face. But I don’t agree it would make her less effective in the business of nunning. There is much to be said for tasting the forbidden fruit before giving yourself to Jesus, rather than going through life having masochistic fantasies like Teresa of Avila. The modern nun should be knowledgeable about sex so she can give advice to teenage girls like Maisie Williams, who is currently finding it difficult to understand her own sexual feelings.
Maisie doesn’t tell us what her problem is, but at the age of eighteen I would guess she has apprehensions about the male sexual organ. This would be perfectly normal. As a girl blossoms into womanhood, a man’s todger goes from being an evil snake to a useful (if rather comical) sex aid. There can’t be a woman on Earth who hasn’t, at some moments in her life, had mixed feelings about the beast. There’s no need for Maisie to worry if thinking about it gives her the shudders.
Labels: Maisie Williams, Nuns, The Shard, todger, virginity, virgins
