The Silence of the Cloisters
An era is ending in Western Christianity.
For better or for worse, a way of life that began in the deserts of Egypt over seventeen hundred years ago is coming to an end. At least, in its Roman Catholic form. It will mean the end of a legacy that extends from the preservation of literacy itself through the Dark Ages to that most terrible instrument of fanaticism, the Inquisition.
The BBC reports that the number of Roman Catholic religious — that is, monks and nuns, brothers and sisters in both cloistered and mendicant communities — declined by a full 10% in just one year. Worse, the numbers of consecrated women, whose ill-paid efforts actually keep the institution running from day to day, declined by no less than 25% while John Paul II was in office.
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