A hidden life of contemplation and prayer

23 May 2014

By Matthew Biddle

The enclosed Carmelite convent in Nedlands is home to 14 faith-filled nuns. PHOTO: Matthew Biddle

On arrival at 100 Adelma Road in Nedlands, one is greeted by an imposing eight-foot high wall that encloses a large building, accessible only through a small open gate.

The carpark is empty and there’s not a person in sight. Perhaps the building is deserted or uninhabitable. But looks can be deceiving.

Behind the walls, past the gates and inside the locked doors live 14 joyful women who have committed their lives to the service of God and his Church.

Nestled neatly in the heart of Nedlands, the Carmelite convent is one of only a handful of completely enclosed religious communities in Australia.

Arranging to speak with the nuns is not too difficult, although the visitor must be satisfied with sitting on the opposite side of a metal grill to the nuns.

But even this is a privilege, because unlike other religious communities, the Carmelites remain inside the cloister as much as possible, making it rare to see one of the nuns in public.

“Most of us try to keep the cloistered life. But if you have a toothache, there’s no question, you have to go and get it looked at,” Sr Margaret Mary says.

This wasn’t always the case, however. When the community was first established in Nedlands in 1935, rules for leaving the walls of the convent were much stricter than they are today.

“In 1961 when Sr Catherine died the two extern sisters could visit her but the prioress had to get permission from the Apostolic Delegate in Canberra to go to the hospital to see her,” Sr Marie Therese recalls. “But it’s become much more normal now.”

For the community’s older nuns, such as Sr Marie Therese, who made her profession in 1963, living within the walls of the convent permanently is of no concern.

“Someone once said the sisters are like a fish out of water when they’re out. That’s not necessarily so, but you do feel at home here,” she says.

But for the convent’s newest member, 36-year-old Sr Qunyh Mary, there have been times when she has desired a more active life.

“Once I had a desire to go out and help the poor… but my spiritual director said ‘You’re dreaming’. If the Pope asked all the enclosed sisters to come out to help the poor, we would,” she says.

After a rare foray outside the convent, Sr Qunyh says one of her friends remarked that she was “returning to her prison”.

To outsiders, it can often appear that the sisters are not doing anything worthwhile in the convent, as the benefits of their hidden works are not easily seen.

“A priest once said, ‘Sister I better confess before we start talking that I really don’t see the value of your life’,” Sr Margaret Mary says. “I had to say, ‘Well, I can’t see it either, but it is a mystery’.

“You can’t see any sick people getting well, you can’t see any children being taught or any lepers being cared for… so it’s a great mystery. You can’t prove it. By practical demonstrations in a scientific laboratory you couldn’t prove our life was worthwhile.”

Because the community is a contemplative one, life in the cloister for the nuns revolves around regular prayer each day. This includes at least three hours of silent prayer, recitation of the Divine Office, an examination of conscience and daily Mass. The nuns wake up each morning at about 5am, spending time in prayer while the rest of the world sleeps.

But the nuns don’t spend all of their time in prayer, they also dedicate several hours each day to manual labour.

“The principle we’re working on is that we shouldn’t be a burden on the Church, we should earn our living as much as feasible with that layout of life,” Sr Margaret Mary explains.

“So mostly to do that we make altar breads for the Mass, and we do a bit of sewing of garments used for the liturgy and altar cloths and those sorts of things. We’re not supposed to be over-busy.”

While most of the clothing the nuns sew are priestly vestments, they also sew their own distinctive religious habit.

They’re an important feature of the Carmelite order, and since the days of St Teresa of  Ávila in the 16th century, the habit has only been slightly modified.

In 2009, Br Paul Bednarczyk CSC conducted a large-scale research project on the practices of religious communities in the United States.

One of his findings was that having a religious habit was an important factor for a significant number of new members.

The two youngest members of the Nedlands community, Sr Thanh and Sr Quynh, who are both in their 30s, agree the habit is an important mark of identity.

“It’s true, young people choose the religious [communities] that wear habits and are very traditional,” Sr Quynh says.

“The habits and all these things make you who you are,” Sr Thanh adds.

“When you support a particular football team, you love to wear their colours, and I think it is the same with religious life, you want to say something about your choice.”

The garment also has other practical advantages, and is suitable all-year round, Sr Margaret Mary says.

“The habit cuts out an enormous amount of thinking for women, because you don’t have to plan what you’re going to wear, or decide what’s suitable to wear when the Archbishop’s coming, you just have the same habit,” she says.

Whether or not the habit helps to attract religious vocations, the nuns say they – like most religious communities worldwide – are at a loss as to where the homegrown vocations have gone.

“I would like to know what’s happening to the Euro-Australians, the Australian girls, now 20 or 25 who come from European backgrounds, or English or Irish, why they are not knocking,” Sr Margaret Mary says.

While she says the youth who come to the convent chapel for Adoration are searching for a deep spiritual life, Sr Marie Therese also finds the vocational crisis a “mystery”.

“I think they’ve got so many attractions, so many choices, that it’s kind of a blinding thing in a way for young people,” she says.

“The whole of society looks to be drawing people outside themselves to experiences or endless entertainments. Often they don’t even think deeply about God until they’re into their 30s.”

Strengthening Catholics’ sense of the sacred, rather than competing with the world’s entertainment is the way to remedy the lack of vocations, Sr Marie Therese says.

“Why is it that so many of our kids don’t practice? There’s something missing to me in their experience [of Mass], otherwise they wouldn’t just be leaving,” she says.

“Entertainment is not it. And so the liturgy can’t be entertainment, because it’s never going to be as good as the world’s entertainment, it’s just not the same thing. [Children and youth] need to realise what the Mass is, that it’s Our Lord’s sacrifice made present.”

But for the 14 nuns in the convent whose lives revolve around prayer, issues such as a decrease in religious vocations fail to disturb their inner peace. They trust in God and remain confident that religious orders will be renewed with new members in time.

“God is inseparably living in us, even if we’re a crazy teenager on drugs… so he does bring up those questions, what is life all about, what am I here for, and you can’t run away from them,” Sr Margaret Mary says.

“God calls, and you don’t have to hear a voice in the human sense, but you have a growing conviction that that’s where he wants you.”