A little late, but for those of you who don’t naturally check out the home page every morning: In today’s “On the Square” article, Elizabeth Scalia writes against Cheating on the Habit of Being . Writing of a nun who justified dropping the habit in favor of street clothes, she argues that
Habits are not necessary to the life of a religious; that is absolutely true. But perhaps when sister referred to the garb as “a costume,” it was a clue that she had lost touch with the deeper meaning of such a powerful social identifier. In doing so, she cheated herself of the privilege of reminding the world, by her mere presence, that all creation is extraordinary and beloved. She cheated the rest of us, too, because we loved being reminded of that; it meant we each really were special, after all.
