With the help of daily meditation, prayer and Zoom, the Poor Clares of Arundel have thrived in lockdown. And now the nuns are recording an album

Social distancing and lockdown come naturally to the Poor Clares of Arundel in West Sussex: after all, they’ve been doing it for 800 years. “In our day-to-day life the pandemic has hardly affected us at all,” says Sister Gabriel, who joined the order of enclosed nuns in 1994, aged 23. “The biggest sadness for us is that we’ve not been able to have visitors – we’ve hardly seen any outsiders for months.”

Now, though, the outside world is hearing from the Poor Clares, because on the eve of lockdown, back in March, the nuns were in the final stages of recording their debut album. The sisters hope it will bring some of the simple, balanced principles of cloister life to those struggling with the fallout from Covid. “It’s been a time of great anxiety and stress, and people really need to zone out and find a place of peace,” says Sister Gabriel.

Continue reading…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You May Also Like

If you think Denmark is all Borgen and social equality, take a look at its awful ‘ghetto’ law | Hettie O’Brien

The eviction of ‘non-western’ housing estate residents shows the darker side of…

The anti-lockdown scientists’ cause would be more persuasive if it weren’t so half-baked | Sonia Sodha

The ‘Great Barrington declaration’ makes claims about herd immunity that its signatories…

Monkey put down but hunt still on after attacks in Japanese city

Male identified as one of a group of monkeys that have wounded…