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Cistercian nuns are female members of theCistercian Order, areligious order of theCatholic Church.
The Cistercian Order was initially a male order. Cistercian female monasteries began to appear by 1125.[1] The first Cistercian monastery for women,Le Tart Abbey,[2] was established atTart-l'Abbaye in theDiocese of Langres (now Dijon) in 1125, by nuns from theBenedictine monastery of Juilly, and with the cooperation ofStephen Harding,abbot of Cîteaux.[3] At Juilly, a dependency ofMolesme Abbey,Humbeline, the sister of SaintBernard of Clairvaux, lived and died.[4]
The Cistercian nuns of Le Tart founded daughter houses in Europe,[2] including atFerraque (1140) in theDiocese of Noyon, Blandecques (1153) in theDiocese of St-Omer, andMontreuil-les-Dames (1164) nearLaon.[4] Charity work was central to the activities of the Cistercian nunneries, and some were given specific responsibilities, such asNotre-Dame-de-Bondeville (founded between 1128 and 1154), inSeine-Maritime,Normandy, which sheltered young girls and mentally impaired laywomen.[5]
In Spain, the first Cistercian house of women was that ofTulebras (1134) in theKingdom of Navarre.[4] Then cameSanta María la Real de las Huelgas (Valladolid) (1140), Espírito SantoOlmedo (1142),Villabona, or San Miguel de las Dueñas (1155),Perales (1160),Gradefes (1168),Cañas (1169) and others.[4] The most celebrated wasSanta María la Real de Las Huelgas near Burgos, founded in 1187 byAlfonso VIII of Castile. The observance was established there by Cistercian nuns who came fromTulebras, under the guidance ofMisol, who became its first abbess. The second abbess was Constance, daughter of the founder, who believed she had the power of preaching in her church and hearing confessions of her religious.[4] In 1190, the eighteen abbesses of France held their first general chapter at Tart. The abbesses of France and Spain themselves made the regular visits to their houses of filiation. TheCouncil of Trent, by its decrees regarding the cloister of nuns, put an end to the chapter and the visits.[4]
In 12th century England, up to thirty rural houses of nuns followed Cistercian practices,[6] with only a minority receiving documentation from the Papacy to confirm this.[7] The fully incorporated English nunneries were Tarrant Kaines in Dorset andMarhamAbbey in Norfolk.[6] As Williams has recorded: "Six Lincolnshire nunneries that claimed to belong to the Order and whose nuns wore the Cistercian habit, were exempted byKing Henry III from taxation in 1268 on account of their statusyet the abbot ofCîteaux wrote to the dean of Lincoln maintaining that even though they wore the white habit they were not members of the Order."[8]
In Italy, 1171 CE, houses were founded of Santa Lucia atSyracuse, San Michele atIvrea, and that of Conversano, the only one in the peninsula in which the abbesses carry acrosier.[4]
By a century later the Cistercian nuns had established houses in Switzerland, Germany (St. Marienthal Abbey in 1234), and Flanders,[4] and more had been established in France, England and Spain. Many of these new foundations were initiated by noble women.[7] La Ramée (1216)[9] inJodoigne, was an important centre of learning, where Cistercian nun Ida the Gentle of Goresleeuw copied and corrected church books andBeatrice of Nazareth supervised the production of anantiphonary.[7] Some nunneries of this period were begun by lay groups of women. For example, La Cour Notre-Dame de Michery, inSens, was originally aleprosarium (a hospital to care for people with leprosy), then was recognised as a Cistercian community in 1225-1226.[5] In the 1220s, BishopJacques de Vitry wrote that the observance of nuns of the Cistercian Order had multiplied like the stars of heaven.[7]
The decline which manifested itself in the communities of monks of the Cistercian Order from the middle of the fourteenth century was felt also in the monasteries of nuns, with approximately 20% of Cisterican nunneries in France suppressed during theHundred Years War.[2] At this time, theConceptionist Order was founded inToledo, Spain, byBeatrice of Silva. Her nuns abandoned the Cistercian Rule for that of thePoor Clares. In France Jeanne de Courcelles de Pourlan, having been elected Abbess of Tart in 1617, restored regular discipline in her community, which was transferred to Dijon in 1625. Owing to the hostility of the Abbot of Cîteaux to the reform Abbess de Pourlan had theHoly See withdraw her abbey from the jurisdiction of the Order of Cîteaux.[4]
In 1602, another reform was effected atPort-Royal des Champs byAngélique Arnauld, who, to provide for the ever-increasing members of the community, foundedPort-Royal de Paris, in theFaubourg of Saint-Jacques (1622).[10] QueenMarie de Medicis declared herself protectress of this institution, andPope Urban VIII exempted it from the jurisdiction of the Abbot of Cîteaux, placing it under that of Paris. The religious of Port-Royal de Paris and of Port-Royal des Champs ended by consecrating themselves to the adoration of theBlessed Sacrament.
However, the vicinity of theAbbé de Saint-Cyran became dangerous for them, and they saw the suppression and destruction of Port-Royal des Champs by order of theLouis XIV in 1710, while they themselves were dispersed. The property and abbatial titles were annexed to Port-Royal de Paris, which subsisted up to the time of theFrench Revolution, before being transformed first into a prison, and then into a maternity hospital.[4]
After the French Revolution another reform took place.Augustin de Lestrange gathered the scattered Cistercian nuns of France, with members of other orders that had been equally dispersed, and reconstructed the Cistercian Sisterhood. In 1795, he gave them a monastery which he called the Holy Will of God (La Sainte-Volonté de Dieu), situated in theBas-Valais, Switzerland. The Trappistines, for so the new religious were called, were obliged to leave Switzerland in 1798. They followed theTrappist monks in their travels over Europe, returned to Switzerland in 1803, and remained there until 1816, when at length they were able to return to France and take up their abode atForges, nearLa Trappe. Two years later they occupied an old monastery of the Augustinians at Les Gardes, in the Diocese of Angers. The Trappistines spread over France, and into other countries of Europe. Since the reunion of the three congregations of La Trappe, in 1892, they have been officially entitledReformed Cistercians of the Strict Observance.[4]
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The status of Cistercian nuns had been ambiguous from the start. Over time, the Cistercian orders put more and more restrictions on the female branch. For example, by 1213, the number of nuns in a house was limited by the supervising abbot if necessary. In addition, the nuns could receive no visitors without permission.
A Cistercian novice who came from Europe at the same time as the Trappists, and who was joined by seventeen women from the United States, tried to establish a community, but circumstances prevented its success.[4]
Vincent de Paul (born Jacques Merle; 1769–1853), atTracadie, Nova Scotia, having asked theCongregation of Notre Dame of Montreal for three sisters to help him with his mission in Nova Scotia, established them there and, after probation, admitted them to the profession of simple vows of the Third Order of La Trappe. However, the community never in reality formed a part of the Order of Cîteaux nor wore the Cistercian habit.[4]
The Monastery of Our Lady of Good Counsel, atSaint-Romuald nearQuebec City, the first genuine community of Cistercian nuns in America, was established in 1902 byHémery Lutgarde, Prioress ofBonneval, France, when on 21 November 1902, she brought a small colony of religious women.[4]
On 29 July of the following year, Cyrille Alfred Marois, as delegate of theArchbishop of Quebec, blessed the new monastery. The means of subsistence for this house were agricultural labour and the manufacture of chocolate. The community was under the direction of the Archbishop of Quebec. Another,Notre-Dame de l'Assomption Abbey atNouvelle-Arcadie, New Brunswick, where there were already some Cistercian monks, was established by the sisters expelled by the French Government from theirMonastery of Vaise, atLyon.[11]
There are numerous monasteries scattered throughout Europe, with France having the largest number.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Cistercian Sisters".Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
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