Why Sr. Natalia Became a Nun | Pints with Aquinas Episode #208

g'day and welcome to pints with Aquinas my name is Matt Fred and today I'll be joined around the bar table by my good friend sister Natalia who is a beautiful young Byzantine nun and we talked about what it's like to be a nun because I don't know never had the chance because the church is sexist it's a joke not a good one but it's a joke this is a fantastic chat that we just had if you're a young woman discerning religious life this is gonna be very helpful to you or if you're just someone who loves conversion stories and hearing about people who radically love Jesus this will be an amazing conversation we get real really quickly one of the things I try to do it points with Aquinas is break people out of the sound bites and just have real discussions about being a flawed human who is trying to love Jesus by His grace maybe you're a young woman who's discerning religious life but you're like I struggle with pornography from time to time or that's a part of my past and I'm not sure like what that means am I just trying to become a religious sister so I will look holy because I've got you know all this baggage we have all sorts of motivations you know in discerning things like this marriage as well as religious life we get into a lot of that and it was just really great you're gonna absolutely love sister Natalia she's the bomb hey subscribe I'm telling you so you have to do it click subscribe click the bell button that way Google will be forced to let you know every time we put out a new video hello is an amazing Catholic meditation app which you should download immediately if you've been trying to grow in your prayer life or you find it difficult to pray but you want to grow in it check out hallow calm it's a fantastic app that'll help you pray it's really well put together and it's a hundred percent Catholic click the link in the description below use the promo code Matt Fred and then you'll get access to everything on their app so they actually have new stuff coming out every day on the free version but if you subscribe which I think you should do because this is an amazing Catholic company putting together a really an amazing thing I have it my wife has it actually I just recorded a sleep story for them you're welcome so you know I read the Song of Songs that might be creepy so if it's too creepy you could go and listen to father Mike Schmitz who has a much better voice than me anyway but anyway I check it out hallo comm as I say click the link below and Bob's your uncle as we say in Australia ok here is my episode I'm really sorry about this long intro here is my episode no I'm not with sister Natalya enjoy [Music] that friggin fantastic it's so amazing I love the colors too what should you cowards yeah it's all the same oh I didn't know that I was like maybe he sent me black because in I have it ya know it's beautiful when I first I don't mean to go on and on about my own product but when I I'm gonna do it when I opened it for the first time I remember being like this is the greatest thing I have ever seen it's what I think when I look in the mirror every day wow that's amazing and you know you're not even allowed to wear makeup right no thankfully I didn't wear makeup before I answered not out of some like moral stance but simply out of laziness that's awesome yeah very system Italia how's it going it's going great Christ is risen indeed He is risen tell us a little bit about yourself who are you where are you from why are you wearing that we had had thing the weird hat thing they all like that not hat we get it a lot it's fine I'm 16 Italia as you mentioned I'm a nun at Christ the bridegroom monastery in Burton Ohio we're a Byzantine Catholic community Northy about 45 minutes east of Cleveland more or less and gosh I don't know what to share I've been here for four and a half years approximately I was tonsured a nun about three and a half years ago that's when I received the new name my full habit the Hat thing what was your name of can I ask you what was your name before I tell you or no you can't ask me you can also reject now I'll tell you it was Toria Victoria that's a beautiful name I was thinking like sister Daphne just doesn't have the air of religiosity that Natalia does yeah I was Victoria very good okay and can I is it rude to ask how old you are oh I'm 29 okay might be I think it's rude to ask women in general I think so but you're young enough you're in that spot where it's true it's more of a baby okay so you're 29 do you have siblings I do I'm the youngest of four I have two brothers and a sister they live in New Yor Connecticut in Virginia so that's also they're all kind of in the epicenter right now of the Cova 19 stuff over there I have four kids two boys and two girls you have a boy that flies I've seen it yes he does he wears a Superman cape and jumps upstairs very dangerous okay very very good when you grew up were you particularly religious your family so that's an interesting question I was I was raised Catholic but not not really I think I think my parents would even say that I wasn't necessarily very well catechized um and amazing people my parents but you know I think we're just kind of in that generation that that wasn't super well catechized so I didn't really know about like the true presence in the Eucharist or things like that you know pretty substantial teachings of the church we prayed grace before meals and we went to church on Sundays and that was kind of the those kind of the the threshold of of the faith that we practiced at home and when I was in high school my whole family left the Catholic Church that's also an interesting question we've never really talked as a family about why it was let's do it live on YouTube right I'm sure my parents are gonna watch this no sorry mom sorry dad it's just error family history no I think I think that probably most of us in our family would say it came about because my my brother was was very seriously injured in the war in Iraq and he so he was in the hospital for about a year and a half and Walter Reed and it just kind of shook our faith I guess because our faith was so superficial that we had never really had to encounter such such trauma and and I think that those kind of things can either bring someone much closer to the Lord or can cause him to to kind of forget him and and I guess we took the latter route so but but like I said we never really talked about it we just kind of stopped going to church as a family and then shortly thereafter my dad was sent to Baghdad and less than a year before retiring and and and then when he came back we just never never really went back to church and so it wasn't something your parents declared it wasn't like we kind of stopped yeah okay so then when did you have some sort of religious awakening surely that must have happened between not really going to mass and being a nun yeah something happened in there when I was in college I I had a pretty big reversion back to the Catholic Church and it was actually oh gosh this is a great story when I I've told this story recently by recently I mean maybe a year ago someone very sweet old lady was asking me about like my conversion story and I said well you know when I I I was in college and I met this guy and I had a crush on him and she was like he mean Jesus like yeah that's what it was I had a crush on a guy and he invited me to mass at the Cathedral in Denver and I was like no way I don't want to go to mass I haven't been in years um but you know I had a crush on the guy so what are you gonna do so I went and I just wept through all of mass and just felt Christ's presence stronger than I ever had which i think is a huge testament to the truth of the real presence in the Eucharist because like I said I wasn't even aware of that teaching but I just like felt his presence there in the matter was there a particular point within Holy Mass that you began to sort of have that experience it wasn't like you walked in January 3rd sat down and said crying was it like the Eucharist in particular or um I can't recall honestly yeah that's a good honest answer was this like a focus guy I don't know you know it's focused as a big presence in Denver right he he was not he wasn't a focus missionary but he was involved in like he was in focus on campus so so that's actually how it continued is he invited me to his adoration group the the adoration group that he led on campus and or near campus and again I said no because I thought this was ridiculous but then I go anyways still haven't learned about the true present so I'm sitting there and I'm like and it felt very strange but I just kind of closed my eyes and prayed and and then we went out for hamburgers afterwards and a focus missionary said to me there he was like hey you should come to this focus conference and I was like no I I haven't been to church in years and this is like the first time I've been back and I'm not going to some like Jesus Freak convention is what I thought it was and he was like it's in Florida and I still said no and he asked why not and I said well I can't afford it which was true but an excuse and so he said we'll pay for everything we'll pay for the flight we'll pray will pay for the conference everything your food while you're there and now I'm thinking like college kid free trip to Florida and with this guy that I have a crush on so so I was like yeah okay I'll go and so he pulls his laptop out in the restaurant and he's like great sign up right now bloody enthusiastic Catholics nothing calm down their champion let's give it 24 hours marinate this idea yeah I was there I spoke it at that seed conference in Florida well how do you know I don't think so I mean you're talking about whether it had multiple but not so many that I think they've been back to this was right by Disneyworld right yes yeah and this was in 2000 and what 12-round they're like yeah yeah yeah that was the one I was there I was speaking you didn't even say hi oh that's so fun yeah I might have wasn't your talk if I spoke yeah wasn't memorable but Cheers no I think I spoke to the men I was so so sick so awfully sick that entire day that I had to speak I I had a banana and a bottle of Pepto Bismol and I remember after my second talk which I think I did quite well at walking down the stairs and just laying on the carpet and I think some like inspired college student came around like I was in the back of the stage show I was behind the curtains obviously wasn't just laying in the middle of the floor but I was backstage laying on the ground and someone came around hey that was so great and I couldn't barely talk but that's crazy so you went to that conference okay what was that like it was you know it was something I had experienced when I was in high school I had experienced some people who were really passionate about their faith and some kids my age and um and I started to feel a pole at that point just because like I saw this joy that they had and I wanted to be around that I just wanted to be around the joy but what was different about this focus conference is I saw this same joy but it wasn't just that I wanted to be around the joy I wanted that joy for myself so that's that's what the experience was for me it was like how like I'm I'm doing all of the things that the world tells us will make us happy and I'm miserable and all of these people have so much joy and so like where did it come from because that's that's what I want um and so that most of your friends secular at the time most of my friends yeah absolutely yeah my my best friend shoutout to Laura she's amazing she's a very devout Catholic and so she was kind of which at the time I found to be like an annoying quirk and but stop your book post right exactly so you can see where that where that got me so so yeah people can blame her for me being a nun but um but other than her yeah most of my friends were secular and even you know for this for this time for a long time after my reversion there was kind of this um there was this great tension within me as I was contending with I I still was keeping most of those secular friends which is not a bad thing we should have it's fine to have secular friends I still have secular friends but but I was kind of like still relying on them and sort of keeping them there simply because I was worried that this whole religion thing might fall through and it might not actually be a sustaining a sustaining happiness and so I didn't want to like burn this bridge with these other relationships if this new fad fell through yes that's a super prudent thing to think because how old were you at the time like 25 that was 20 yeah that's a super prudent thing like okay I can see these people seem happy maybe I'm beginning to experience this thing that they're experiencing but this might just be an emotional high that I'm gonna quickly overcome you know several weeks after this school experience yeah that's neat all right your big beautiful buggers I just want to take a pause and say thank you to our second sponsor strive strive have you heard of strive it's a it's a course I put together it's a 21 day detox from porn course I put together and you should check it out because it's super cool actually that says fourteen thousand men are in it right now there's actually seventeen thousand men I've been told so they need to update this this is a 21 day detox from porn course you get videos from me every day you get to join a thriving online community of men it's a hundred percent free you're welcome and you can be as anonymous as you want so click reviews up here if you're still skeptical and see what real-life men real-life flesh-and-blood men are saying who did the course strive 21 calm strive 21 dot-com back to the interview so was there anything about I mean this is probably the first time many people when they go to the focus conference are so taken back by all these beautiful nuns and priests and people really living out their faith and doing it fully alive did that freak you out you said like Jesus Freak type of thing or were you more moved by that I was more moved I don't think that there was yeah it's so great normal right yeah I yeah I mean some nuns are normal I'm not super normal but I guess yeah it was refreshing to see I don't really remember meeting nuns there I have a clear experience of the first time I remember meeting nuns but I don't remember meeting them sir when's the first time you met nuns oh that was when you were young you mean no no it was a well it was these nuns from Christ about your monastery it was um when I was when I was so after I just had this reversion right um at some point I was like well I need to discern my vocation because that's what good Catholics do and like now I'm a good Catholic so as I want to start discerning my vocation I'm I'm not really seriously thinking about it because in my mind it's like if men want to become celibate priests as most Catholic priests are then they're sacrificing a wife and children and the the physical intimacy of another but in exchange for that they're able to absolve people of their sins and and be the vessel through which bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ like they get these cool like superpowers you know and and in my mind like the nun doesn't get any of those things and so why why would a woman give up those things um yes it's like the equivalent of becoming a brother a religious brother it's like great you're already not having sex or money or any kind of power at least like be able to absolve people from sins you know right yeah so that's not what I do and I managed to come and kind of yeah something so absolutely I mean it was it was what I thought and so in my mind obviously women only became nuns if they were ugly and couldn't find boyfriends um and this is logical to me and so and I was dating plenty of guys I was I was a serial dater in college you know these who just like jump from relationship to relationship yeah so um so I was dating plenty of guys and so I was like so I don't need to become a nun and so I kind of like very quickly passed on from that and then I met these nuns so I don't know if they would want me to say their names at the time so now mother Theodora mother Cecilia and mother Gerber Ella we're on a road trip on their way to an ordination in Las Vegas so they stopped through my parish in Colorado road trip it really was an ordination I promise okay so in the Byzantine Rite at least in our Park II or at least with that particular Bishop I think the priestly ordination --zz were done at the person's home parish and he was from Las Vegas so so I met them on that road trip as they were on their way through and then I also went to the ordination so I saw them there as well but I remember when I met them just being so surprised because I'm like but these women are beautiful and certainly they could all have boyfriends and they're all smart and talented and so what's that about and so then that kind of like rocked the boat a little bit you know and then I was like maybe I need to think a little differently about this whole discernment thing yeah that's really interesting I know what you mean I think a lot of us have kind of experienced that I was a part of a diocese the third largest in the world at least geographically I think the first is probably somewhere in Russia I don't know but in South Australia I was part of that diocese and I think the last ordination they had had there I might be wrong but I think it's about 30 years ago 25 years ago well that continues so when I was when I got serious about being Catholic and discerning the priesthood I remember looking around it I mean many of the priests were really good and decent men and some of them were even holy but it's you know a lot of them would just sort of like wearing the civvies and call me John and I'm like oh my gosh and so remember the first time I started meeting like young priests who were well rounded and humble and interesting and I remember that shocking me as well mm-hmm but then you kind of yeah no that's it I got nothing beautiful okay so did you grow up Roman Latin Catholic Roman Catholic I did I grew up Roman Catholic so it was it after you met these women that you became Byzantine no by that point that was already my home parish it was shortly after coming back to the church I there's a guy who brought me to the to the Byzantine parish and and it was just um this guy and I never I mean I think we went on we went on one date but otherwise it was just um we were just friends but but I just in my very first Divine Liturgy I absolutely fell in love with the Byzantine right and so which which I like to emphasize for people um you know that it wasn't that it wasn't a situation of like I was frustrated with the Roman Church or overthrowing Catholicism or anything like that you know I wasn't running away from anything and in fact I think that we really need to check our motives when we're running away from things but it was rather a running - I just really loved the Byzantine the Byzantine liturgy I loved the the theology and the iconography and and everything and so it and then I did about the Roman simply because I wasn't so catechized yeah that's beautiful when did you stop thinking seriously about becoming a nun hmm probably probably after college I was a missionary for a year and a half after college and and in that time I started more seriously more seriously discerning yeah sure I think like here's some of the objections becoming a nun right like the more superficial ones are like you don't get to have sex and and like nice to hoods and nice clothes and stuff as far as the clothing thing I will say it's kind of nice to not have to figure out what I'm gonna wear each day preach it do you know this is something that I've done I've pretty much gotten rid of every shirt of mine that isn't black so even though I don't have a religion everything exactly okay but yes so like I mean because obviously there's the most substantial things which we should address too like having a family and growing old with a husband and things like this but I want to get yeah let's get to that later official stuff sex and handbags how did you deal with that sure was that even not so much the handbags but I miss jeans I miss jeans a lot um so yeah you know and it's interesting I think I think people can get this idea in their heads that that priests and nuns and monks because as you mentioned monks are like the the masculine parallel to a nun right um so or brother so priests monks and nuns I think people often just kind of assume that we're like asexual or something right that we no longer it's like you become a nun and you no longer experience like sexual desire and this is just ridiculous um so and and I think it's I think it would be the equivalent of saying that like when someone gets married they no longer are sexually attracted to another human being you know besides it sounds like right and so yeah it's it's definitely there but your question of I suppose I mean that objection really comes from the world I suppose because sure I suppose like those who aren't living the Catholic faith may be living a lifestyle in which they do hook up or have you know somewhat intimate relationships with different people but I remember for me when I was discerning the priesthood it wasn't like oh no again f-6 because for me my only options were to relationships in a sense was like I could get married or I could because it wasn't like I can have multiple sexual politics that's what a lot of people actually who are on the path to religious life are thinking about anyway so maybe I maybe I phrased that wrong but I suppose that's kind of more of a secular sort of objection that's probably one you get when you're I don't know did you run into like random people at pubs and places well I'm not I'm not really frequenting the pubs but um but I but I do I do come across this I meet some pretty some pretty bold secular people and I like those people I like those you know yeah I bet they've met a match I'm sure you it's-it's tell us about one of the conversations well it was more so I encountered this a lot before before I entered the monastery right so when I first became a missionary I was I ran into a professor who most certainly will never listen to this podcast but he was a physics professor that I had and and he was so frustrated by my mission work I promise this is getting to the point he was so frustrated by my mission work because he's like thousands of people can deliver diapers and or anyone can deliver diapers and only only one in a thousand can do the physics that you can do and so like this is a waste and and I received so it's I think that is the greatest I think that's the greatest objection I get from the secular mindset is that it's a waste whether whether they're referencing they might be talking about not having sex but they're they're referencing it in this sense of it's wasteful to not act on that desire when you could have what you desire and so I encountered this some in I was a I was a teacher high school teacher before I entered the monastery for a year and and some of my co-workers you know one of them called me in an effing idiot and and and others just told me what a waste it was and and they they talked about they did talk about not having sex but they more frequently referenced what you already what you already touched on of not having a family but what I what I found so interesting is that it's this this mindset of sacrifice for the sake of intimacy with the Lord is what is so not understood by my secular society because these same people the same people who were thinking it very odd that I would give up sex and a family for the sake of pursuing this vocation if I had told them I'm not having a family for the sake of my career they would be fully supportive same people you know so it's not simply that they they think family is the most fulfill it's that they found my motivation for it to be unfathomable yeah that's a really great distinction it's it's almost like if if God doesn't exist then what you're doing does seem like it's a bit ridiculous and I think for many people even people who would say they have some vague belief in God they really don't believe in God or that intimacy with Christ is an actual real legitimate you know non fictitious thing that you're capable of having and so forth I think that's really what it gets down to people just lacking faith so for example I had people in my family when I told them I was discerning the priesthood they were like well why not just become a social worker and that reveals so much right it feels that they're basically doing the same thing one is a bit weird and the other one doesn't have to be sure yeah I I didn't remember one encounter I had since entering the monastery of one of these seculars he just like didn't get it we went a family took a scheme a few years back so we went skiing in her full habits and it was very fun I don't think any was snowboarded I think I think we all skied I'll tell you those skiing in Ohio is very different than skis gained in Colorado but anyways the I'm on the ski lift um with a man who is a ski instructor but he's he's off shift and and I just wish I'd had another nun with me I did for one of the lifts but he and I got on the same lift again and he'd um you know he'd he'd had a couple whiskey's under his belt at that point I think and so he's just not holding back um and he says so he's asking us about like TV shows and we're like yeah you know we don't we don't really watch TV like we have a TV but we don't have we don't cable or anything we just like you know once a month or so we'll watch movie together we watched Sound of Music last week and though this one appropri so he's like you don't have you don't watch TV and we're like no not really um a couple episodes of Star Trek every once in a while um and then he says well but like how do you get your fix and he's just so completely baffled you know and he's like because because you're so happy you're you're both so happy and he's absolutely bewildered you know um he's like you don't you don't have TV and you don't have sex and you don't have how are you happy you just want to say have you met the millions of people who are not short on either miserable yeah right so including this man clearly so no that's interesting okay so I should have started with this because I'm sure we have a lot of these not not a lot but we do have a significant chunk of like evangelical viewers as well so as a nun you take three vows or no how does it work so so technically in the east we don't take vows but but yes we we promise it's more the life profession of a nun is more the the bishop gives a catechesis and and we agree to the things that he's asking of us so but we don't have the same formula that the West has of saying like I vow this and I about it but but we do we do agree to promise poverty chastity and obedience so all right so it's a check oh so chest and he's pretty pretty straightforward so you'll never get married you'll never have kids is that is that painful even now as I say that is that kind of like sharp on excruciating yeah yeah of course so I this is this is something I get often as well you know is when I give talks I give I give a lot of talks to teenagers um which is really stressful because I don't really like giving talks so um right now I love teenagers high school yeah but I used to tell them that that I thought God made them cute and funny on purpose to prevent me from killing them but they yeah I get this question a lot at the end of my not at the end because by the end they know but when we have QA they often say and I think adults think this as well it's just the teens who are bold enough to say it they say why don't why don't you want to have kids or why don't you want to be married very common question and and I and I respond with but I I did want those things and I still do want those things and then they're kind of shocked because a nun just said that she wants to be married and to have children but it's a matter of I I think that those desires in fact enhance the fruitfulness of my vocation of my celibate vocation because God can absolutely provide for people who don't have those desires but they're very natural desires and to be a celibate is a supernatural calling and and I think that the the fact that I deeply desire a husband really helps me to better desire to love Christ as a husband and and the fact that I that I deeply desire children helps me to embrace as children all of all of the children that the Lord puts into my life of all ages you know so these these are good things they're gifts those those desires are gifts and they they don't go away when you take the habit and and there's still a pain when when I hold babies and when I'm playing with children and and when I see couples walking holding hands but but all of that pain is so fruitful when it's offered to the Lord and I don't say that so just as like some pious yeah yeah statement I mean it's been a very real experience for me of seeing that the tears that come from that pain water the soil of the garden of gethsemane and it and it bears fruit and and I've seen that in my life yeah because I could some people would think okay I get that becoming a nun doesn't mean you don't want to be married or have kids but I would imagine a lot of people thinking that eventually you sort of come to peace with that such that you no longer feel that sort of pain and you just use the word excruciating maybe talk a little bit more about that because I'm sure people in discernment who are either in religious life right now who are discerning entering religious life are thinking just like you well I know I have this deep desire for children like it's it's it's really strong okay but just so what does it look like to kind of come to peace with that or do you know I I think absolutely you come to peace with it I think I'm I've I have come to peace with it I've already Requested my life profession and as you know I was supposed to make my life profession four days ago on Mother's Day yeah I've been mother Natalia that's right yeah can you get out of this right now like if you wanted to just bail you know if you yeah I'd be like cool my final profession thing coronavirus saved me from that bullet now I could say and no one's gonna be upset with me like is that a thing oh absolutely if you if you had have made final profession and then bailed is that less cool much less cool yeah it's I mean it's it's allowed we're not we're not in Chains um but it's it's looked upon in in the same way that before marriage yeah right yeah yeah I told Jesus when when my profession was delayed again just to clarify it was delayed because of coronavirus not because I'm getting cold feet or anything but when it was when it was delayed I told Jesus I was like Jesus this is not smart on your part to give me this extra time you know me like this is a terrible idea but he just kind of chuckled and and just yeah he knew that I wasn't going to bail and and and at this point it's true it's I've totally given my heart to him and he knows that and I know that and the day of my profession that will be public so everyone can see that but it's it's not like the reality of it hasn't changed you know it's something that we all struggle with in the meta our state in life whether we are in our 30s and still single whether we're married with a handful of children whether we're married and can't have children all all of us from time to time experience this intense temptation and I think often it is that if my life was somehow different then it would be okay like if I've married the wrong person and if I if I because I was young right I was young and I was you know sexual desires and stuff and so I you know got effectuated a bit but really I married the wrong person and that's why I'm unhappy or it's because of this child or these couple of children that I have that I can't be happy I mean we all experience that and it's but it's tempting to think that like it's this it's like that I'm the only one who's experiencing this like that this is some somehow somehow I've screwed something up and now I'm in this position and this is this is only happening to me but it's such a human experience I find that when I speak to my friends or people like yourself that there's this desire for something I you know I don't know what point I'm trying to make I'm sure there's a good one in there no and no but it's true it's this and and that can be and and the devil uses this against us absolutely right so it's it's the times that I'm it's the times that I'm frustrated with my community or that I'm you know like really desiring really desiring physical intimacy with a man or anything like like those are the times that I that I think about like well how much easier would it be if I just had a husband who loved me and a cute little baby to hold I think next time I just I think was yesterday my wife and I were getting into a heated argument in an elevator so and it wasn't really pretty so I'll just sit I'll just I'll take little videos while we're fighting I'll just click record when she doesn't realize and we'll just go back and forth I'll text those to you I I had a very I had a very beautiful experience of this in prayer one time because there was I'm trying to said if I want to share this oh yeah I'm gonna share it um so the Lord put it on my heart so I'm gonna share it there was a time since entering the monastery that that I fell in love with a man and and it was it was a really difficult time because as I prayed through it I knew and and mother I was I was fully transparent with mother and our mother Theodore our hug Yamana is just so incredible and she's yeah she's great and she's very much she wants God's will and she doesn't want people to be in her monastery for the sake of numbers and so I had already been in the monastery for a few years at this point you know but she but she's still you know she when I brought this to her she was like well let's let's pray with this let's see if this is God's will for you you know and she's not afraid of she very much believes as we all in our community believe that it's called discernment for a reason you know when people enter the monastery they're not stuck here it's it's supposed to be a continual discernment until the day of your life profession so so anyways I bring this to her and and as I pray through it I just know that it's not what the Lord once um and and I think that I had been I had gotten to a point in my spiritual maturity at this point that I knew I couldn't act on it and it was this I I think that it was the first it was the first time in my recollection and that I that I knew God's will for me and I I just didn't want to do it um and I was like Jesus but I love this man and so as I'm trying to pray I'm often like he's coming in to mind and and I'm picturing you know a life of marriage with him and children and all this and it's just so it's so hard and it's so painful and because I know that this isn't what God once and so finally one day I'm sitting in prayer and and this image comes to mind of us married you know and I'm and I just say I'm sorry Jesus I know I'm not I'm not supposed to be thinking about that right now I'm supposed to be with you and he says no think about it and so then he lets it play out only this time it's not like all the other times this time he and I are screaming at each other because we're in this heated argument in an elevator and and and likely honestly knowing knowing this man he and I like we're both very high temperature and and I'm sobbing and he has his arms crossed because we're like struggling to conceive and and so it's he's allowing me the Lord is allowing me to see all of the the painful parts that come with marriage and and not trying to discourage me from marriage because of that it simply was a time of letting me see that it's not all of the the rainbows and butterflies but in that moment while struggling in community life I was picturing it to be you know hundred percent that's really beautiful thank you so much for sharing that I think it's just so crucial that people begin to share appropriately as you just did the reality of what it's like to be a married person or a religious person I just interviewed Scott Hahn whose episode is on my youtube channel he was so beautiful he shared about a time where Kimberly his wife do you know who Scott harness you're a no idea yeah I am I used to babysit his grandkids Oh lovely where's Scott well Kimberly asked for a transfer because she felt found herself attracted to somebody she was working with this is got shared another experience where you know he was hitting it off with this woman and they were talking about theological things because I guess that's what gets Scott going and he talked about having to make the choice like sit on the opposite side of the room from her at this conference or something I just was so honored that he would share that because the temptation is we don't share this stuff because we feel like we're bad people because of it or that we're failing or that we should be better and then the masses like me and other people are just walking around being like what is wrong with me like what something is really wrong with me because I had this thought the other day that like if I married someone else I would be I would be a lot happier you know and just to realize that this is kind of part of the human experience which our Lord wants to meet us in and which the accuser can use against us yeah cuz you're spot-on because I mean imagine you married this guy and then it's like you don't you don't escape the what if no one escapes what if because you could have been like what if I had have like stayed and and chosen to be a nun like what would my life look like you know right okay so why be a nun then like why did you like why would anyone why honestly though I mean imagine the kind of generic line is something like intimacy with Jesus or something but I suppose we have a lot of young women who are watching this and they're wondering if they should be a nun and they want to know if their motives are correct like yeah why how did you know you were supposed to be a nun because I mean you could just be a married woman who was super into Jesus why a nun sure and we need we need married women who are super into Jesus right like this is the church needs we're all called to holiness so you know it's a really good question and it's one that I struggle to answer because the I just am NOT an eloquent person and so it's difficult to articulate but the the easy answer of it but I will I will kind of extrapolate the easy answer of it is is peace and joy and joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit and and the psalmist tells us that the Lord's voice has a voice that speaks of peace right so what I what I know is that I first came to the monastery on my first visit out of obligation because again good Catholics discern their vocation and so I was 99.9% sure I was called to the married life because I love men and I love babies and so I I just came to the monastery for a three-day visit to rule out that point 1 percent so that I could I could feel good in and then pursuing marriage straight because I had ruled this other thing out I'd done my duty and in that three-day visit I just experienced such a peace and joy that was not it wasn't surface-level it was it was a profound peace and joy that that I experienced in my time at the monastery in my prayer about being at the monastery and and things like that and it was it was unshaken by by the more superficial concerns and something that really solidified it for me is that when I was here for that three-day visit mother's mother's sister had just passed away very young from cancer and so her biological sister non-language that probably needs clarified so so her funeral mother's sister's funeral was was while I was here on the visit and so obviously there was much grief in in the monastery we were preparing for another discerner who was allergic to cats and we had a cat so I'm like washing walls and floors and things like that this whole weekend while they're doing funeral preparations and and it's all just like there there was no earthly reason for the peace and the joy that I was experiencing at all but it was it was there and in the midst of all of it and and it was something that that kind of guided my whole discernment because I went back and forth I I took longer periods between discerning with the monastery than most of the other nuns here because I was scared and because I love men and babies and but it's it's like whenever I was in those periods there was just an unrest and whenever I came back to the discernment that's that's when that peace came back and and I realized also that part of it was so after my after my five week observer ship here there's a period right before applying we can't you come for three to six week visit called an observer ship and at the end of that observer ship I told mother and my spiritual father that I didn't feel comfortable applying because because I I knew that we were all called to holiness and that I had had so many relationships with men that some of them were unholy some of them were unhealthy many of them were both that I couldn't even picture a holy marriage for myself and and so I felt if if I were applying to the monastery at that moment it would be because I felt like it was the only way I could be holy and and I didn't want to enter the monastery and become a nun if I thought it was the only way that I could be holy if it was the way that the Lord wanted me to be holy if it was the way most conducive to me to become holy then then fine but not if it's the only way I can be holy so I needed to be able to to envision a holy marriage for myself before I could take the next step and so I didn't apply then I I left and and I didn't know what that meant if it meant that I was going to need to date again or not or whatever but I just I needed time and then yeah that's really beautiful thanks for sharing that I have no doubt that many women watching this have that same sort of sentiment you know that they've maybe they're addicted to pornography maybe they've been in several unchaste relationships maybe they've had abortions and there's this temptation this this perhaps legitimate fear that well the only reason I want to be a nun is so I can somehow whitewash that because I'm damaged goods anyway so I'm not sure what Holy Catholic guy would want me so if I become a nun I'll at least like appear holy and people will look upon me as having accomplished something and being heroic and what do you say to women who have those sorts of thoughts um I would say they're all I mean there are many different thoughts stemming from those same lies that that the devil tries to use to dissuade us in pursuing whatever vocation so first and foremost we need to learn that our goodness is in our being and and the fact that we're made in the image and likeness of God it's it's not our goodness is not in what we've done and in fact if my if my goodness is based on what I've done then I'm damned because because what I've done has been pretty horrible in my life and so first of all I would say that that what you have done in your past regarding sin cannot be the reason for your pursuit of a particular vocation because it'sit's the same thing I was talking about before about becoming Byzantine right that we we shouldn't we shouldn't be running away from anything we should only be running - but but the devil will use these lies about us and about our about our lack of purity or anything like that he will use this to no end and it's the same he'll use the same exact angle to convince someone to come to the monastery for the wrong reasons for the habit to cover up their impurity and then another woman who maybe has a genuine call to be to be a nun he'll he'll tell her but you're too impure you you can't do that you know you can't wear the habit like those other nuns because because they're pure and you're not and then he's telling this other girl you should go to the monastery to wear a habit because it'll make you look pure even though you're not and all of these are are the same lie used by him in different ways and I experienced this very really um before I was tonsured she knows what that means for those who don't know oh sure so tonsure tonsure literally means haircuts I think Orkut but it's when the the the haircut that you get when you become a nun and so that ceremony is called your tonsure so it's when I received the habit and my new name so the time leading which which it's not it's not the final commitment right that's life profession but it still is a big step and so the time leave it's a big step because they've ruined your hair take a big chunk of your hair right you can leave if you want but there's actually we call it at the monastery sometimes that so as you can see our veil still leaves a little bit of hair out the front and sometimes the bishop will cut a little too close and so then a little a little tuft sticks out in the front and so we call that at our monastery we call that the Tantra tuft very good sorry mine is always tucked in but it's very good so in the time leading up to my tonsure father michael lee your your spiritual father he had he and I were talking and you know it was maybe six months before my time chair or something and he says I'm praying for you as you approached this time like I know it's gonna the devil is gonna throw everything at you and I was like father Michael I'm fine I'm like everything's time please so maybe I should blame blame this on him but now I love him so before my time chair in that time shortly after father Michael talked to me I I had the sudden thoughts of like all of the reasons I shouldn't be tonsured all of the reasons I shouldn't be a nun and and how I would make a horrible nun and I'll be unhappy and even though you've had this destroy all this the past time that you've been here like it's gonna go away and and you you were so good at teaching you should go back to teaching you know all of these things and I very quickly dismissed these as being from the devil I was like it was just very obvious so then he he just kind of turned turned around and came from a different angle and once he realized that I wasn't going to give in to that and that I was going to be tonsured anyways and then and then he comes from the angle of yeah you know it's it's right that your tonsured because you should be a nun because let's be honest you're not pretty enough to get a boyfriend and like what are you going to do with your life at this point now that you've been in the monastery and so it's it's like he's very willing to change tactics and and he's if you're going if you're going towards the vocation that God is calling you to and the devil can't steer you a rave away from that then then he'll just try to make you do it for the wrong reasons because you know for like at least alter your motives to bring you to bring you further from God oh that's beautiful yeah what a minefield huh it's there's a lot going on we often totally ignore the fact that we are engaged in a spiritual combat and you know that's the reality in which we find ourselves it's not it's not this sort of what would you call it like I sort of peaceful life where our life just gradually unfolds like we are in a world at war and our life and our vocation and our discernment like will not make sense apart from recognizing that sure but but in the midst of it where we're asked to be to be in the eye of the storm where the commas and and to rest there with Christ and to experience it around us and and and allow it to be around us and to fight in the ways that we're asked to fight but also to not to not lose our peace yeah amen um what's it like tell me what your what is your day in the life of a nun look like lead us through a day huh well each day is different but in our monastery typically I guess we we start with Matins or morning prayer at 6:30 and that we abbreviate it a little bit and so it's an hour and a half so like abbreviated it's an hour and a half so we start with 15 minutes of the Jesus Prayer which have you talked about the Jesus Prayer in the podcast are you I'm gonna make you do it as well feel free to jump into it now if you want sorry so the Jesus Prayer is the the traditional prayer of the east and we usually pray it on a tchotchke so I have one here on my wrist but it's Lord it's some variation of this Lord Jesus Christ son of the Living God have mercy on me a sinner and so we we pray this in silence for 15 minutes at 6:30 and then we have mountains until 8 and then we have time for for spousal prayers which is what we call the time when we do our cell rule in our inner cell spousal prayers and exercise from 8 to 10 what's what spousal prays so spousal prayers are when we just have time for private prayer you call it spousal well in our monastery being Christ the bridegroom monastery we we have a strong emphasis on that spousal relationship with Christ and and also desire to in many ways recapture the spousal imagery that that secular society has kind of distorted not kind of majorly distorted noises so spouse Juarez and then exercise prayer and exercise from 8 to 10 and then we have a couple hours to do work which the work entails much of it is just you know where we're like any household and just a bigger household than usual and so we have to do all of the cooking and cleaning and finances and stuff that any household would have we also will bake the bras for the communion bread or we have pasta Nia's post Ania is the Slovak I'm having to explain a lot of terms here who Stinney is the Slavic word for deserts and so our post inea's are the the little retreat houses in which people come for time alone with the Lord in the desert so so booking and managing and cleaning the post inea's are part of the work things like that 12:00 to 12:30 we have either 1st 3rd 6th or 9th hour and then some intentions as well prayer intentions and the daily readings lunch on our own more work until 3:45 and then an hour of free time and then Vespers we start with 15 minutes of the Jesus program and then in silence and then Vespers or evening prayer for about an hour and then dinner after dinner we have either recreation or free time or work depending on just what we need to do and then from 9 to 9:30 we have complan which is night prayer and we end that by praying antiphonal II chanting a chapter of a song of songs in our particular community that's not a normal complan thing but again reclaiming that that spousal imagery I'm not sure you're allowed to have a favorite book of the Bible but that's mine oh it's so beautiful I think you know my favorite book the Bible good okay beautiful is that pretty much every day except Sunday when you have Divine Liturgy like you have Divine Liturgy once a week yeah we so we typically have Divine Liturgy well it's kind of we're in between things right now and obviously with coronavirus things are even more up in the air but we were having divine liturgy basically son every Sunday and then one other day during the week and that day changed just based on like what big saints there were and things like that and then the 12 major feasts of the year will have liturgy for that's beautiful regarding the Jesus Prayer I was talking to father Michael II and I was saying you know I'm I have this kind of prayer role that I've set myself you know in the morning and the evening and things like this it's nothing heroic it's quite short and but you know he said well how is your sort of like the personal quiet prayer going and I'm like don't don't really do it you know and so it was really good cuz he so he's really kind of pushing me to do that so it's it's so it's it's so embarrassing to say in a way because I mean I've been at this Jesus thing for 20 years now I came to our Lord in the year 2000 you know I was 17 years old in Rome so anyway all that is to say that I I've been doing 15 minutes of the Jesus Prayer a day in silence you know like it's feel walking it's so easy to get off a few hundred you know but I'm just like sitting and and and staying there for like I don't know seventy five Jesus prayers or something and it's amazing how difficult it is how arid I am how chaotic my thoughts are but in all of that just for bringing that before the Lord and I love the Jesus Prayer for that for that reason because as you know obviously but for those who don't watching it's very rhythmic like using your breath to breathe in praying half of the prayer and out and just become sort of a part of yourself and to be able to sit in silence but that silence doesn't mean you know nothing it's just like this communion with the Lord and I was just sitting there the other day and I was just feeling angry and frustrated as I was praying there's no opened up my eye and I saw like kids sandals on the floor why the bloody kids sandals here why can they but like bringing all of this right to the Lord like all of it like it's all good you know you are in charge it's it's so beautiful and you'll make your own tchotchkes too huh and we do yeah yeah and and it's a it's a very beautiful it's a beautiful prayer for for so many occasions but particularly I find it beautiful for for transitions so so for example when we when we pray for 15 minutes before Vespers it's it's such an important time for me like when we even when we if we have something going on that we have to shorten Vespers or something like that it's never the Jesus Prayer that's shortened which I think is very important because I've just spent this whole day working like crazy my mind is on full speed yeah and to enter straight into Vespers would just be very diff because we we sing all of our prayers and it's very a priest friend of ours likes to tease the Byzantines and he calls our prayers like a cacophony of noise or something like that but anyways it's like being thrown into a raging ocean then you just like toss to it right right so I need to in order to be able to do just like catch a couple of droplets of those those waves like I need to be able to calm myself in order to even be able to to enter into the prayer so the Jesus Prayer is very helpful for that as well yeah that's beautiful very good very good and then how big is your and here's not a question why do you call the monasteries in the East and not conference because we're monastic so this is yes both both men's men's and women's communities in the East are called monasteries I think this is also just Europe it might be European I could be getting this wrong but it might not just be Eastern Catholics like I know a French community who are called a monastery so I think it's more about being monastic but I think at this point in because wouldn't Carmelites like Western Roman Carmelites wouldn't they be called monasteries or no I don't know I don't know I've heard them as I really don't know the difference okay but where monastic so we're and we're like male monks basically so one of our one of our monk friends says that this is our this is our beard oh yeah is there any what's this what's the symbolic meaning of your of your habit I mean it's black but what is there to the the habit is that so is there a belt is there a shot key that you wear like what's yeah there there is a belt there's our belt has and I have a tchotchke hanging off the side of the belt this is the chachki on the side is that a thing that your sisters do yeah we do particular monastry I stand up is that what you totally do you do what you want okay yeah so you can also see the hidden earphone strings so we have a belt with the three bar cross on the front which you probably can't see in the video chutki on this side and then on the back of the belt we have etched into it some ninety it's on the back you have belt how you supposed to remember well it's also it's in likes ilanic or something and the let god arise and let his enemies be scattered whatever that Psalm is I'm Catholic I don't I love that prayer but I yeah so in the habit itself so this is a very traditional Eastern monastic habit so if you if you see Orthodox nuns today this is what they'll be wearing you know we often get the question of do you did you get your habit from the Muslims and it's like no they got their outfit from us like ours thank you very much hipsters we also are vegan for more than half the year so we were doing that before it was cool for fasting religious fasting not yeah yeah yeah yeah anyways so and then the black is just symbolic of death um and slimming too which is that's right that's that's the real reason is because it's slimming we do nuns do still struggle with vanity so now what do you think yeah one thing that's different in the east of the West that a lot of our Western viewers won't realize is that you don't have religious orders in the same way in the east as they do in perhaps can you explain yeah sure so so in the West they're developed I think probably from Benedict correct me if I'm wrong that but in the West they're developed this this concept of orders in which people would take the rule of st. Benedict or the rule of st. Dominic and so this thus you would get the Benedictines the Dominicans so on and so forth Franciscans from st. Francis and so on and so forth in the East this this same thing didn't develop you will find you will find today Eastern orders but that's that's not how traditionally things kind of developed so it was more that each monastery would develop their own typical on which is what we call our our rule of life and and they would base it off of what was written by by Paco meais or by basil but it's but it wasn't each each monastery has their own rule it's not and and they're based off of like our our rule is based off of some other Eastern communities that we know we used it as kind of a starter but ours is very specific to again like the spousal imagery and and our monastery started in response to saint john paul ii saurians holly lumen and so there are a lot of references to that and and theology of the body and things like that beautiful well I've got some questions from our patrons that I wanted to throw your way oh I can't vouch for these questions I haven't actually until now and I and and just to our patrons who asked the questions I'm not going to read their names in case some of these are very personal and I don't want it going to help them this person says it's a lady sister Natalia what are some good tools for someone who is very scared to be open with God about their struggles and finding their true self in God's eyes what are some meditations that we can focus on mmm that's a really great question I would say I'm gonna answer the two separately as far as struggling to be open with him I would say enter into a place where you know you're not going to be seen by others and wherever that may be in your bedroom in a church that's locked whatever and just let down all of the masks and if it helps alleviate your fear just remember that he already sees it you know I I I've said a lot of words to Jesus that I would never say on a podcast particularly expressing anger and because it's like he knows it anyways so I might as well just say it and put it out there and shed light on it and so don't be afraid to show him not because he's you're showing him something new but because he already sees it and so you might as well just just talk it out you know it's like the little kid who's who's caught lying or who's caught stealing and then tries to lie about it it's like we saw you steal let's just talk about it so that's what I would say about about struggling with being real with him but then as far as a meditation so when I when I first came back to the faith I I mentioned that I had this this sort of rupture within me of struggling with I I hadn't been a practicing Catholic for years right so I had for years built up these horrible habits living a very stereotypical college life making a lot of mistakes and then when I came back to the faith I suddenly believed all of these things were wrong and thought I needed to stop doing them but those habits don't just go away overnight right so then I'm struggling with this tension between I'm doing what st. Paul says I do what I do not want to do and and the tension there caused a lot of self-hatred and in a very deep depression and when I when I met my spiritual father he he saw this right away the self-hatred and the depression and he gave me a very very simple prayer to pray and he said I want you to pray this you know every day or every other member how often he said and it's this lord help me to see myself the way that you see me and so this is what I would give you for a meditation this is the first of two I'll mention because as I started praying this prayer I didn't even believe it I didn't even mean the words but simply to say it over and over I started to actually want it and I went from one team to want it to actually wanting it I wanted to see myself as he sees me and that really transformed a lot of things in my life so that's the first thing the second thing what I've been praying a lot with recently which goes back to the struggle of being open to him is pray with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane because because in the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus in his humanity was not afraid to say Lord let this cup pass father let this cup pass from me but then he ends the prayer with but not my will but yours be done and so we need to be fully transparent with God and then accept whatever it is he's asking of us that's beautiful thank you this next question comes from a lady who says do you have any advice for women who experience same-sex attraction and are trying to discern the call in their life and then she says and you can answer the second question first on another note do you drink coffee coffee every day yeah absolutely yeah I I've thought about giving up coffee for Lent sometimes but then I realized that's actually like putting an additional penance on my sister's not just on myself and so that's probably not fair my spiritual father and I have actually been talking about this a lot recently I wouldn't be surprised if he set you up to ask me that so anyways yeah anyway you shouldn't be addicted to anything so I'll go back to the first question though the second one was easy the first ones much harder and and much more important Coffee is very important though so two most important things I think are three most important things develop your develop your prayer life this is the most important this is the most important step in discernment it's not about discernment is not about trying to figure things out and - it's not just about making lists and thinking through things and reasoning through things it's about increasing your intimacy with the Lord and I say that again not in the pious way but in a way of we need to have that intimacy in order to see what his will is I think of it sometimes it's like a married couple who have been married for for very many years you know it's if you if you go out to eat you don't need to ask your wife necessarily what do you want me to order for you when I go out like you you probably just know by this point and so it's in developing that relationship or you don't know when you think you know and then you get it wrong and it starts a huge fight by the relevant but it's it's are developing our relationship with God daily in in quote-unquote normal life needs to happen in order to then think through those bigger things it's not just like I pray when I have the bigger things so first of all develop your prayer life absolutely second of all have a spiritual director particularly if you're discerning a vocation but really I think this is just a good rule in life so I have a vocation sorry spiritual director someone that you you trust someone that is holy and someone that you can be real with yes and then third an important part of discernment to remember and and people often don't realize this in discerning with our monastery is that it's not only your discernment it's also the discernment of the community um so you know when I was when I was discerning I'm still technically discerning but at this point I'm pretty settled right so but when I was when I was first here it was very much it wasn't just me trying to decide if this is what I wanted it also was mother and the other nuns praying through and discerning is this a good fit is this what the Lord wants because ultimately if it's not what God once then then it's not where you should be what about specifically though it seems next attraction right so I would say with that and I think that's where a spiritual director a spiritual director and the community with which you are discerning come so much into play because I don't I don't think I've never I've never heard the church say that someone with same-sex attraction is not is not allowed to pursue a monastic vocation I've never heard the church make that declaration either way though this is something I suppose that could be worked out with one spiritual director and the the monastery in question yeah absolutely and yeah I guess I would say just just talk with specific communities because that's it's a question that's that's so hard to discuss on on a grand scale yeah communities each each community is so different and it might be very different for example if it's a community that's COI stirred versus a community that's active and it might be very different for a community that's small versus a community that's large or anything like that so so yeah I would say don't be afraid to talk to the communities absolutely and and don't be afraid to talk to your spiritual director about it thank you Mark Adkins says what's it like living in a community of women are there interesting complexities that you can share oh thank you mark Adkins so there's at least once a month that make things pretty difficult so you all sync up don't you women are so much cooler than men at least how their bodies work continue that's yeah I just talked about periods on on a podcast about nuns this is getting real real if anyone's wondering nuns do still have periods what I know so it's it's kind of a um I feel like God kind of played a joke on me in this cuz when I was in college I was not at all interested in entering a sorority because I'm like why would I want to live with a bunch of women women are crazy I remember telling I had a conversation with my spiritual father one time and I'm talking to him about where I get why along so much better with men and because I just think women are absolutely crazy and a few minutes later I'm like sobbing in direction I'm just sobbing and he says he says you remember five minutes ago he says um I don't I don't really know why you're crying crazy yeah so oh that's beautiful it can be hard at times but it's also the difference between in all seriousness the difference between being in a monastery and living in a sorority although sometimes we refer to ourselves as the Alpha Omega sorority but and between that and living in a sorority in college is that all of these women are striving for holiness you know and we're not there yet you don't become a nun because you're holy you become a nun because you want to be holy but we at least can support one another in that and we know that when we fail and what when we make mistakes as we do every day the other women are still going to love us and so the the relationships that are formed are very beautiful and and one of the great gifts is many of the other nuns here I I would not have been friends with had I not entered the community I would have dismissed them because there are different temperaments than me they like different things than me but circumstance has placed us together God manufactured circumstance and it because of that I have these beautiful close relationships with women that I would have otherwise never even given a chance to be my friend you know and it's just uh it's a great gift so beautiful so many of these great questions he is one and this kind of gets back to something we were talking about earlier Stephen says any advice for a man whose fiance is a former postulant any thoughts on how I can support and love her when she has moments of regret or trouble finding her purpose that's it good luck with that sister guy oh okay well I guess advice would be don't be it this is it this isn't what you're gonna want to hear Steven but I would say help her and be open to supporting her in in rooting out that regret you know exploring it and figuring out is this is this regret I regret that's of the Lord or is it a regret that's simply what we were talking about earlier yeah see the grass that's greener on the other side because if it's if it's of the Lord you need to be open to that too just as my discernment is discernment until the day of life profession he said they're engaged right yeah yeah yeah he said fiance yeah so similarly yours is discernment until the day of your wedding and so you need to to be open to loving her enough it's to deal with these things right now right like obviously we're going to have moments of regret even in marriage you're gonna have temptations we made the wrong decision but it sounds like now would be the time to bring all this stuff to the surface sure yeah and and if you if you and I I would say that if you are married and and she's still experiencing regret I would say to help her to remember that this marriage is God's will for her at that point and this is something that I've always looked forward to the day that I either get married or make my life profession is is that for as long as I struggle of what is God's will once I make that commitment I can now be assured that this is now God's will for me and so once once the two of you are married that is his will and and if that helps with the regrets then that actually happened to me like after was about three years into my marriage I remember having these temptations that I should have been a priest and that I feel like somehow missed the boat and I screwed up and I shouldn't know of and I remember feeling very alone in that because it was a very embarrassing thing to admit because when I admit it to other people they would look at me with one eyebrow raised as if to say like why would you struggle with that like what is so bad about your marriage and there wasn't my wife's awesome you know so this is kind of gets back to like being real and just acknowledging these things but yeah it was that realization like I might have this emotional kind of reaction to where I'm at but but trusting that this is the Lord's will yes and and find out what it is sorry I just thought of one more thing I would say as you as you're willing to explore that regret with her find out what it is that she's actually regretting or missing because if it's a matter of some aspect of the prayer life maybe this is something that you need to be developing in your prayer as a couple or that she needs to be developing in her her private prayer or things like that you know yeah Simon Says I have a cyst Kali I'm going blind you'll get there sister just give it five more years I have a sister who is a faithful Catholic who has considered the consecrated life but she is frustrated with the church's view of women and thinks at the role of single women nuns consecrated virgins hasn't been well defined or explored by the church for example an intellectual order that helps discern dogmas and teachings or an order of women who form checks and balances for the bishop like st. Catherine of Siena she is frustrated with her discernment as a sister have you found that the church doesn't have a well-defined pathway to encourage and create more influential women like Saint Catherine well that's a that's a big question I think that a way I think that this something that the church is now seeing I can't really speak to to what it's seen in the past but I think that the church is starting to see particularly the the role of spiritual motherhood that women can provide and I think that this is so important because it's it's actually a tradition so you mentioned Matt earlier about my life profession would have been will be the day that that I start being called mother so the tradition in the is that every every nun when she makes her life profession starts becoming starts being called mother so I'll go from sister Natalia to mother Natalia and so it's not just the Hege Menna or the Abbess who's called mother but all of the life professed nuns and this is this is the same in the in Eastern men's monastery so life professed monks will be called father even if they're not a priest or deacon and so it's it's symbolic of our spiritual motherhood and the fruitfulness of our spousal union with Christ and just as a priest is called father symbolic of his spiritual fatherhood and I think that this is something I know that this is something that's seen in our a party right now because our our Bishop references this and the importance of the spiritual motherhood that our our monetary provides and so I know at least our Bishop is seeing it and I hope that many are because I think that I think that the problem that we've had not just in the church but in in the world in society is is that instead of instead of trying to embrace what women are called to give as women as as mothers and as as brides the the mistake has been in trying to give women the same roles as men right and to promote to promote sameness between men and women and to be to be equal and to have equal dignity it does not mean to be the same and in fact to be the same would reduce our dignity because it's taking away what we are called to provide so I mean is such a beautiful point keep going yeah and I I know that they're I mean they're our intellectual communities I know there are there are female Dominicans and things like that who are just much smarter than than I am but it's probably it's definitely the case too that there are you know Catholic women who have PhDs or they're licentiate degrees who are contributing to the fields of philosophy and theology and these sorts of things oh absolutely so we it's it's a met I could see it being a bit of a strange idea to think that in order to have influence in the church I have to be a celibate you know as a woman my only option is like celibate sisterhood or something you know sure yeah I yeah when I'm one of my friends here um Beth a very beautiful woman she is she's a philosophy teacher at the at the seminary here so she's helping to teach seminarians and yeah so and beautiful beautiful okay one more well I've got a thousand questions I promise I'll let you go soon but what are you what are your parents and brothers and sister think about this oh that's a great question so no we so my my parents so first my parents um I didn't mention this but after my reversion just a year or two later my parents came back to the church and they're now they're now very devout and they even like I don't know if they're doing this right now but for a long stretch they were praying Byzantine mountains and Vespers everyday and things like that just so so beautiful amazing amazing parents and very moral they raised me well but they so they were both not only supportive but ecstatic you know and and proud and all that I think they I've seen I've seen my mom struggle with with some things at points but but she's very proud and and very delighted that I'm anon and I think that it would have been a much greater struggle for her if she did it already have grandkids yeah honestly so I would imagine it's much harder for for people who who are only children or whose siblings don't have children yet or things like that so anyways parents very supportive my brothers and my sister none of them none of them were unsupportive what's I'm like hanging out with you though like do they want to walk around the street with you or and so into the shops so um well one of my siblings doesn't really yeah he and I aren't really in touch so I'm gonna try it now okay yep yeah but he the others but he also he was the one who when I told him I was becoming a nun you know he says what who do I need to beat up like what guy broke your heart and like man that's not the reason I'm becoming a nun he just don't get it but yeah you know it's interesting I think my brother my other brother I think he really enjoys being out in public with me he enjoys getting the look and I was visiting him in California recently when when you and Cameron helped me um find a place to stay while I was there and he he and I went for a hike and you know someone stopped me while we were hiking and said good morning sister you know very excitedly and and he just like his chest kind of puffed up and I could tell that he was kind of proud and and very he always calls me sister and very my parents call me sister Natalia and all of that so that's beautiful um but then you also kind of look different to what's you know you know generally thought of as a Norfolk so Peter I imagine you probably have a lot of people who look at you and think you look like a just maybe you're a Muslim or something yeah it happens it happens sometimes we don't we can never tell how often it happens because you know often people just wouldn't say so we don't always know what people are thinking I I've been surprised with how many people recognize us as nuns I think part of that might be the chachki and the belt maybe they assume it's a rosary and but yeah we have we have people sometimes who um but I think the most common response is people will people come up to us at the airport or at the grocery store whatever and they say what are you and I and I always want to respond a human being what are you a rude human being but no but I understand the curiosity and it's it's more amusing than anything but yeah I mean we're is this thing that you wear around your neck like it comes up quite high here up to your chin I mean yes it's totally it's up to the chin mm-hmm it's uncomfortable it's actually very comfortable it's a very very soft material and it's it's much more comfortable than the first stage of formation is called a DoCoMo's which is greek for maybe one who desires to learn or something like that I don't know it's it's all Greek to me but the DoCoMo is that first stage we were like a headscarf that just um like goes like this and then ties behind your head and that one's much more uncomfortable because it's like on the ears and um yeah so and we do have exercise habits that we can wear when we exercise so beautiful well this has been so great I I have definitely felt your maternal affection for me sister so has my wife just occasionally when you text us out of the blue to tell us you're praying for us there's been a few times that I've been in this kind of particular place and your texts with your advice a particular timers like you know he brought me to tears so thank you for your for your motherhood and and and saying yes to our Blessed Lord and thank you for agreeing to come on the show to share with us today absolutely thanks for having me and then just about your monastery how can people sort of do y'all have a website that people can look up if they want to learn more about your monastery yeah our website is Christ the bridegroom org our email address same thing Christ the bridegroom at gmail.com make sure you have the two peas in there because otherwise you're sending it to Christ he bridegroom or Chris the bridegroom rice the bridegroom org you said yes I'm looking it up and how many women are in your ministry there are six of us none is so beautiful let me show everybody here all right I'm sure that yeah right now people are looking at y'all whoa so crazy kind of like a wizard we haven't we have a seventh nun with us right now who's visiting from Ukraine for a year or two oh that's cool now I believe Teresa of ávila didn't want her convent to be larger than nine do you all have a set limit we don't have an exact limit but we would never we're aware of the mind said that the monastery should be smaller and more more family style so we would never have probably more than maybe 15 or 20 in one community so once we got to I don't know maybe 12 ish or something 10 or 12 we would send a couple to start a new community and they would be autonomous so they would they would write their own tipic on that rule of life I was talking about and you know be in contact for support and all of that but but eventually they would be a standalone thing that's beautiful okay well thank you very much my wife just texted me and she said me and the four kids outside Texas when you're done I'm at my house right now social problem hello I will okay well god bless and thanks so much all right thanks Matt okay thank you very much for watching I hope this was a helpful episode and I hope that you'll share it because it really does help get the word out I want to say thank you to all of our sponsors patrons rather who make this show happen we are trying to release a plants with aquinas espanol channel in which we pay voice actors to professionally dub pints with aquinas clips in spanish so that we can reach out better to our Spanish friends and so I'm really excited about that we're doing that we're doing a bunch of other things that I'll be telling you about soon so you should consider just bloody well consider becoming a patron patreon.com slash Matt Fred you don't have to obviously but if you want to if you believe in what we're trying to do here and you want to get a bunch of free stuff in return like check this out let's just go through this together shall we you give ten bucks a month to us here at points with Aquinas we will send you a signed copy of my book Marian consecration I'll put a pints with a quiner sticker in it so you can put it on your laptop so everyone knows you're cool you'll get regular video reflections from me and they are private just to patrons you get post show wrap-up footage from pints with Aquinas episodes that nobody else gets access to so me and the guests just kind of get even more real than we do in the shows you get access to an ever growing library of audio books such as papal encyclicals works by Thomas Aquinas and interviews with philosophers converts theologians that other people don't get access to you also get access to our book studies we just did a big book study with our patrons on the divine comedy on Flannery O'Connor we just are 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Channel: Pints With Aquinas

Views: 56,673

Rating: 4.9642348 out of 5

Keywords: religious life, catholic nun, my life as a nun, what it's like to be a nun, convent, nunnery, catholic convent, monastery, byzantine, byzantine catholic, byzantine nun, vocation, women religious, vocations for women, discernment, discerning my vocation, god's will, god's will for my life, marriage, Matt Fradd, Pints with Aquinas, Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Mike Schmitz, Bishop Robert Barron, Word on Fire, Pope Francis, Catholic, Catholicism, Catholic Church, Priesthood, Eucharist

Id: wNV4IeLfHac

Length: 97min 18sec (5838 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 01 2020