I pray that this type of horror does not exist anymore inside the convent. This poor nuns confession is quite haunting and insightful as to a dark secret among a certain Catholic convent. Bless her heart
https://youtu.be/5WkKmU_W8NU
What a nightmare...
Nowadays, it is hard to even find a Roman Catholic Nun in a Habit, and the habits found are not like habits of old, so perhaps they have abandoned this practice - I sure hope so...
I have observed the making of Nuns in the EOC, and they are not enrolled prior to age 18, and then they serve as novices for 5-12 years prior to taking the vows, and are given every opportunity to depart if they so choose... Men are much the same... Monastic tonsure is VERY willfull on the part of the novice seeking it... And not all receive it... Many are sent back into the world to marry and raise children... WHY one should become a monastic is THE question that needs to be answered in both word and deeds... Indeed, one novice I know, is utterly unconcerned if he will be tonsured or not, and this because He is serving in a monastery and knows God, and trusts that God will see to his tonsure or not, and either way is God's directions, not his...
But tonsure before one's mid-20s is unusual, and one must then have lived the monastic life for some years and become accustomed to its hardships and labors and life of prayer... And then desire to live that way till death...
The video spoke of the "black veil", being placed on a girl with no experience who did not ask for it, but had it sold to her by the Mother Superior... There is an order of monasticism that a very few are called to, who approach their Abbots to receive - It is called by us the "Great Schema" and is highly ascetic... God has to call for it, and the monastic must then seek it... Never is it imposed... Everything is by "auto-exousia" - eg self-authority - weakly called "free will" in English...
It is normally not given prior to 50 years of age, and in Russia, many of these indeed are cloistered in prayer without ceasing, and still do their labors of obedience daily into old age...
And these are Holy Elders... Often with great Gifts... Praying without ceasing night and day...
Hard to find, harder to meet with... Often life-transforming...
The Mother Superior in the video seemed kindly motivated...
But not pastorally enlightened...
Appealing to the idealism of a young child to impose the black veil is just wrong...
I did not watch the entire video... Just the first 1/3d... Too painful...
Arsenios
