nuns on oprah

If you didn't see the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist on Oprah yesterday, you should check out the segments on the show's site. I was blown away, not only by how well the sisters were able to preach the Gospel and explain their life, but also by the fair and welcoming treatment given to them by Oprah and Lisa Ling, the correspondent who spent a night in their convent.

My favorite quote from the interview:

The vow that most nonclergy are curious about is the vow of chastity. Instead of giving their sexuality to another person, nuns instead give it to Jesus. "He's a hard husband to be married to because if something goes wrong in the relationship, I know it's me," Sister Mary Judith jokes.

"A lot of times people will think that we're repressed because we don't have sex or we're not indulging in the same kind of things that most people our age are indulging in," Sister Mary Judith says. "I feel like I've reclaimed my sexuality from an oversaturated, sexualized world and that I don't want to be an object. I view my sexuality as a precious thing."

Sister Mary Judith says sexual urgings don't go away once a woman becomes a nun—sisters just have a different way of approaching them. "I think that there's a common concept that sexuality or sexual urges or sexual feelings are bad and dark," she says. "It's an integrated part of who we are and expresses a part of who we are. It is not all that we are."

Sexual feelings are kind of like chocolate, she says. "Just because I have this desire for chocolate all the time doesn't mean I'm going to have to eat chocolate every time," she says. "It's using the desires, the same desires I have for a greater calling and for a greater cause."

I can't wait to see the vocations that come from people seeing this segment.