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Cloistered
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
6 posts | 5 read | 5 to read
"A profoundly moving memoir which gripped me . . . Its about spirituality and asceticism and silence and sisterhood, but also about how flawed human beings can abuse power and how hermetically sealed communities, which should care for and protect their members, can be dangerously vulnerable to threats from inside their walls. - Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, The Porpoise and others An astonishing memoir of twelve years as a contemplative nun in a silent monastery. Cloistered takes the reader deep into the hidden world of a traditional Carmelite monastery as it approaches the third Millennium and tells the story of an intense personal journey into and out of an enclosed life of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Finding an apparently perfect world at Akenside Priory, in Northumberland, Catherine trusts herself to a group of twenty silent women, believing she is trusting herself to God. As the beauty and mystery of an ancient way of life enfold her, she surrenders herself wholly to its power, quite unaware of the complexity and dangers that lie ahead. Cut off from the wider world for decades, the community has managed to evade accountability to any authority beyond itself. When Sister Catherine realises that a mesmerising cult of the personality, with the distortions it entails, has replaced the ancient ideal of religious obedience, she is faced with a dilemma. Will she submit to this, or will she be forced to speak out? An exploration of the limits of trust, Cloistered shows us how far youthful idealism can take us along the road of self-surrender, and of how much harm is done when institutional flaws go unacknowledged. Catherines honest account of her time in the monastery and her dramatic flight from it is both a love song to a lost community and an exploration of what is most compelling, yet most potentially destructive when closed human groups become laws unto themselves.
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Jen2
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
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Pickpick

Fascinating!!!!

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monalyisha
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
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Mehso-so

I struggled through this memoir. The author converts to Catholicism, seeking the peace of the Heavenly Father after the death of her beloved earthly one. She joins an order of contemplative Carmelite nuns, anticipating a life of quiet simplicity and radical love. Instead, she finds a cult of personality, which leads to a decade of emotional (and eventually physical) abuse. Though I imagine it was cathartic to write, it wasn‘t easy to read. 👇🏻

monalyisha 1/1: I‘m hesitant to admit that I did not connect with Coldstream. Though I have empathy for her, she presented as sanctimonious. I suspect I‘d experience many of the same emotions in her position: disappointment, disillusionment, sadness, anger, and betrayal…but her story needed more mastery and variation in its telling. Aside from a few beautiful passages, it just felt stuck and bogged down: too much of one thing, not enough of another. 5mo
Texreader Amazing review 5mo
monalyisha @Texreader Thank you! That means a lot. I actually rewrote it a bunch of times, and my Goodreads & Storygraph reviews are much longer. It‘s hard sometimes! 5mo
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JamieArc
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
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For #nunlit readers, I don‘t think the tagged book is one of our reads, but you might enjoy this. If you subscribe to Katherine May‘s (newsletter - that feels like the wrong word…), you can listen to this interview.

JamieArc @monalyisha I believe I saw that you read the tagged, but I‘m guessing you received this in your inbox too… 6mo
monalyisha I am! I haven‘t read or listened yet, though. I‘m afraid of spoilers. 😅 I‘m not sure I‘m loving the book, tbh. But there‘s still quite a bit left for me to listen to, so jury is out. 6mo
jlhammar Thanks for the interview! This book is on my list to check out. 5mo
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monalyisha
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
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🌖🌿🤎

Amor4Libros I read this one and it was very interesting! 6mo
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Victoriahoperose
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
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Mehso-so

A bit slow in parts. Interesting for me because I grew up Catholic and went to Catholic school my entire life. It gave a lot of insight about religious life and what it means to be a nun. I just felt like some of it was not as engaging as I thought it would be and I found it to be a little bit boring.

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Reecaspieces
Cloistered: My Years as a Nun | Catherine Coldstream
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