The Trekkie Mother The Marine Nun The Sensual Nun (Excerpted from Chapter Six: “The Sensual Sisters,” Benedictines in Ferdinand, Indiana) Tess Duenas is forty-two, but she appears decades younger, with her short dark hair, jade green eyes, and suntan from gardening and running; I did a double take when I first spotted her jogging in shorts around the monastery. She had initially considered—but then dismissed—becoming a sister in high school. At age twenty-seven, as she was about to enter graduate school, she felt a deep pang and knew she had to seriously consider religious life one final time. Her parents supported her for a year while she sorted out the issue. Her biggest obstacle was celibacy.
Tess asked various sisters how they dealt with the physical longings. Some sisters joked that they took showers; others said they went for walks or sought physical activities. Others confessed celibacy was difficult at first but became easier as they got older. The sisters’ honesty helped Tess see that living a celibate life takes courage, not belief in “special graces” or denying her humanity. For Tess, talking about her frustrations is more helpful than ignoring those feelings. “It doesn’t seem as intense,” she said, then screamed: “Ahhhh! If I were to keep it in and be all quiet and secret about it, it would be frustrating. I find that it opens others to be free also and say, ‘You know, I feel that way, too. So let’s go for a walk, or let’s go play tennis.’ “I’m not going to deny it. I’m not going to stuff it,” she added. “It’s a matter of going and sharing our story with each other. We joke about it. That’s one tension-relieving way. We also cry about it and say, ‘You know, I’m just having one of those horny days, so watch out!’ “We’ve learned to find intimacy, and it doesn’t have to be sexual. I can be sitting with another sister in conversation talking at a very deep level and that would be so intimate. That’s what intimacy is: getting to the very core of who we are and to be able to share that.”