Career and calling

A life's work

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Daily bread

New order

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By Helyn Trickey
CNN.com Interactivity Editor

(CNN) -- "People always ask me," says Sister Antoinette Cedrone, "Did I doubt? Am I crazy? But I want to tell you that I always wanted to be a nun. I found what I was looking for: I found fulfillment."

Even as an Italian girl being raised from age 6 in Uruguay, Cedrone was drawn to the church. She received school instruction from the Salesian Sisters of St. John Bosco, and knew by the time she was in fifth or sixth grade she wanted to follow their example.

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Do you think of life in a Roman Catholic convent -- or monastery -- primarily as a religious calling or a career?
A career choice. More today than in past decades and centuries, religious orders are founded on concepts of service and work.
An even mixture. Faith supports the career -- the ministry -- and the career supports the devotion.
Mainly a religious stance. Nuns and monks do fine work, but mostly to support their cloistered lives.
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"They liked to be with us," she recalls of her childhood experiences with the sisters. "I wanted to be like them. Their happiness definitely attracted me."

But early on, Cedrone found resistance. Her mother was firmly against her daughter's plans to become a nun.

"My mother was very opposed," she says. "She thought I was throwing my life away."

Torn between the desire to please her family and a strong summoning to the church, Cedrone wrestled with her life choices even as she completed a bachelor's degree in education at William Patterson University in New Jersey.

Then a letter changed everything.

"How long are you going to keep God waiting?"

A friend's simply written question jolted her to the core, and helped launch Cedrone's 27-year-and-counting vocation to the church.

"I didn't want to disappoint my mother," she says, "but God won."

The Salesian sisterhood -- also known as the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians -- is said to have more than 15,000 members in 87 countries. In North and South America, there are some 5,100 of them. Their mission extends to schoolteaching, running youth centers, special programs for "at risk" youngsters and, per their literature, providing "social administrative structures to raise our voices in defense of women and girls."

Daily bread

For Cedrone, who's based in Haledon, New Jersey, teaching has always given her great joy. "Even if I hadn't been a nun," she says, "I would have still been a teacher."

But joining the Salesian Sisters' order not only gave her the chance to teach and mentor children -- it also gave her support, prayer and community.

THE PLACE OF FAITH

The Gallup Organization asked Americans in several age groups how much importance faith holds in their lives. Here are the results of the survey.

The story is that both St. John Bosco and St. Mary Domenica Mazzarello had similar visions in different parts of Italy -- he in Turin and she in Mornese. In each case, they felt they'd been entrusted with the care of children. The two founded the order in 1872 -- from the beginning, then, the Salesians have had both men and women as members.

"Working with youth is our ministry," says Cedrone. "We do that 24-hours-a-day. We walk together with youth, and so that keeps us kind of busy and young, even if we are 60 or 70 years old."

In addition to her teaching duties, Cedrone directs the vocational ministry for the eastern "province" of the order in the United States. In that capacity, she tries to give young people a peek into what's often perceived to be a strictly cloistered life.

"The young people, before they come in to the church," she says, "their biggest concern is chastity and celibacy. It could be a little pinching."

Cedrone refers to one of three vows -- chastity, poverty, and obedience -- which nuns eventually take after years of training.

"You don't blame them," she says of youth today. "Look at how sex is portrayed in our society." The implication is, she says, "'If you're not having sex there's something wrong with you.'"

She balances this concern with the idea that love is channeled in different ways when you consecrate your life to Christ. Above all, she says, it's important to know we are all human beings -- and we must love or die. Those who dedicate their lives to the church just love differently.

New order

As the century begins, however, Cedrone's message that religious life is a viable, perhaps enviable, option is reaching fewer and fewer people.

According to the Official Catholic Directory, there are 100,000 fewer nuns working and living in the United States today than there were 35 years ago.

"It's a little concern," Cedrone says. "We look around and we say, 'Gee, we are fewer and fewer.' But we're experiencing a great sense of hope in the church. It's like a wake-up call," she says.

"It's a very real life. In the same way that there's a commitment between a man and a woman, you must continually recommit. Love prevails, and I think it's the same in religious life."

— Sister Antoinette Cedrone, Salesian Sisters

Cedrone finds young people are very open to listening and beginning their quest for a spiritual connection at a younger age. While she used to start talking with college students about a life in the ministry, more and more, she says she finds herself explaining her life choice to high school students.

"They're looking for more. There's a rebirth of the spiritual thirst," she says. "They've seen it all and there has to be more to this life than power, sex and money. They're looking for prayer, community life and a sense of mission."

Chances for young women to find out more about the Salesians come in the form of half-day retreats held in different parts of the country. In the coming months, these "days of prayer and discernment" are scheduled for March 18, 2001, in Kenilworth, New Jersey; March 31 in Miami; April 21 in Tampa; May 12 in New York; and June 2 in Haledon, New Jersey.

As an international collective, the order is an avid user of the Internet, both for contact within the community of Salesians and for recruitment.

FIVE STEPS TO SISTERHOOD

Contrary to the use of the term in most informal contexts, a "novice" in the Roman Catholic sisterhood goes through an extensive period of preparation, reflection and study before becoming a member of her order. Here's a quick look at the five phases undertaken by the Salesians.

But with so many other career options available today, especially for women, can the church really compete?

"They have so many options to choose from, but no models of commitment, even in the workplace," Cedrone says. "I feel for them (young people), and I find some are afraid of commitment.

"You just tell them that it's just one day at a time. Take it in small steps."

A life commitment to the church can be difficult, she says For her, not being able to take a vacation at will or buy gifts for her family have been the most troubling drawbacks to her service. Her ministry's schedule makes vacations hard to plan. And her life may not supply the money for gifts she'd like to buy her family.

"It's just your own sense that you'd like to give them something, say a ticket to Italy. But it's not essential just because you're feeling the need. I make them a card," she says, "and talk with them and they have my love."

Women who go into convents often cast their service in terms of marriage to Christ. Some wear wedding rings symbolic of their commitment. Sister Antoinette Cedrone likens her vocation to a marriage.

"Every life has its challenges," she says. "If there is a hurdle we will go over, under or around it. It's a very real life. In the same way that there is a commitment between a man and a woman, you must continually recommit.

"Love prevails, and I think it's the same in religious life."