Were the Sisters of St. Antoninus Female?

As a boy at St. Antoninus Catholic Elementary School, I, along with most of my classmates, often wondered whether or not the Dominican sisters that taught us were actually female. Of course, we knew in some abstract sense they were; after all, they were called “sisters,” and the pronouns “she” and “her” were used to refer to one or another of them. Still, judging by the measures that we knew, we were uncertain. The flowing, ankle-length white tunic, gave no indication of body shape, and the square veil covering the head right down to the eyebrows cabined their hair. They wore shapeless, thick-heeled black shoes. Their faces were unlipsticked, unblushed, uncosmeticed. The features of those faces seemed uniformly angular, as if formed from sheet metal. Several of the sisters had moustaches or a chin whisker or two.

As far as we could ascertain, the sisters bore no resemblance to our most familiar models of the female gender: our moms. They did not wear Capri pants and espadrilles, did not wear makeup, did not use Clairol, did not buy Elvis Presley 45s, did not moon over the muscled arms of Cincinnati Reds first-baseman Ted Kluzewski, did not smoke cigarettes and drink cocktails, did not play canasta with “the girls,” did not shop with what my dad considered ferocious abandon at Shilitoes Department Store, did not use slang, did not read “Peyton Place” or watch “General Hospital,” did not freely dispense loving caresses, and did not smile with both mouth and eyes when speaking to us. And while all the sisters wore a plain gold wedding band, we were given to understand that it symbolized their marriage to Jesus Christ, a state of wedlock that, even in our prepubescent naiveté, we knew was nothing like the one that united our moms and dads.

Some of us, the proto-Darwinians, I suppose, speculated that the sisters might be a subset of the female gender, evolved specifically for the ascetic religious life of the Dominican order. Others of us, the proto-Lamarckians influenced by the science-fiction movies we flocked to see, held that the sisters had once been fully gendered females but had undergone a transformation upon being consecrated to sisterhood, had been unsexed, degendered, unwomaned—an opinion that spawned a related debate: whether that transformation occurred immediately or over time. A few of us, perhaps the proto-post-gender acolytes, argued they were special creations of God, unique beings who exuded a compressed, muscular authority, lean and mirthless, aerobicized, symphonic, designed to inculcate the Baltimore Catechism and discipline whatever impulse-imbued desire we sought to gratify with a jacketing moral responsibility. If religious instruction were tennis, the sisters played a power-baseline game. But, whatever the reason for it, we unanimously agreed that the sisters were an alien and other gender, at best, only tenuously female.

And so I would have blithely continued indentured to this idea had I not one day been sent on an errand to the sisters’ convent, an ominous building to our young imaginations, an impenetrable abyss of unlit mystery. Still, I considered it an honor to be chosen for this mission, a testament, so I thought, to my flawless performance as an altar boy and charter member of the Knights of the Altar. I knocked on the door and explained to the answering Sister Norita that I had been sent by Sister Mary Joseph to fetch her reading glasses. Sister Norita ushered me into the foyer and told me to wait. I watched her departing figure until she disappeared down the shadowed hallway and then, beset by curiosity, took a few steps forward and glanced to my left into what was obviously a living room.

Now, I suppose I expected something approaching a monastic cell, a spartanly furnished room, devoid of personality, lit by rows of votive candles and featuring crucifixes hanging on the otherwise bare walls. I was surprised, therefore, at how strikingly ordinary it seemed: bright white walls with pictures of The Sacred Heart, The Good Shepherd, and the Blessed Virgin Mary crushing the head of a serpent; a couch and several arms chairs; swagged drapes and valances; an end table upon which lay a crucifix, a missal, several hymn books, and a coffee cup; a cabinet stereo, some potted plants; and a card table upon which rested a partially completed jigsaw puzzle. With a minor change here and there and the addition of a television set, it could have been the living room in any of my friends’ houses. It could have been the living room in my house—with one neoned exception.

Sitting on an ottoman was Sister Bernadette, one of the younger nuns, combing through obviously just-washed chestnut-brown hair that reached more than halfway down her back. That hair: it was clean and good. It shone. She combed deliberately, unhurriedly. I stood transfixed. There was no doubt, no doubt whatsoever, about Sister Bernadette’s gender. And as I gazed at her, as I regarded her, as I considered her in that simple act, I suddenly realized that she, and all the sisters, were characters in their own stories, not just mine or my friends’. I imagined her, wholly, and realized that she, and all the sisters, was like my mom and all my friends’ moms. They had been young girls, lived young girl’s lives, lives with tea sets and dolls, lives with dreams and secret crushes, lives with skinned knees and silly jokes, lives with best friends and irritating brothers, lives with movies and fan magazines and diaries. Just like my mom and my friends’ moms, except that one group exchanged marriage vows, devoting their lives to their husbands and children, and one group exchanged religious vows, devoting their lives to God and His children. Two different consecrations, but the same ultimate purposes.

Sister Nortia had stolen up alongside me as I stood there. “Sister Bernadette has lovely hair, doesn’t she,” Sister Norita whispered. “Yes,” I whispered back. “It is her glorification of God,” Sister Norita said; “God has given her beautiful hair, and she takes care of it and keeps it beautiful to honor his gift to her. Do you understand?” “Yes, sister,” I replied, but I really didn’t, not then. But later, when I learned about purpose and obligation, about perspective taking and humility, about empathetic concern and commitment to something larger and more durable than myself, I understood that, however meager they may be, my gifts, like rivulets of wax cordoroying a candle, flow from the candle’s hollow only if the wick is trimmed and set aflame.