credit, Bethany Bell/BBC
-
- author, Bethany Bell
- scroll, From Vienna (Austria) to BBC News
The three Austrian nuns, in their 80s, who fled the nursing home where they were admitted, were allowed to remain in their convent “until further notice.”
But Catholic Church authorities say she will only be able to stay there if she stops posting on social media.
Sister Bernadette, 88, Sister Regina, 86, and Sister Rita, 82, are the last three nuns at the Kloster Goldenstein Monastery in Elsbethen, on the outskirts of Salzburg, Austria.
The three claimed that they were taken from the monastery against their will, in December 2023.
They returned to the monastery in September, with the help of former students and a locksmith, drawing the ire of the church authorities.
Their superior, Abbot of Reichersberg, Markus Grassl, called on the nuns to return to the nursing home. She claims that her decision to return to the monastery was “completely incomprehensible.”
The nuns’ story sparked interest around the world. Their supporters helped them with food, electricity and on social media, posting videos of their daily lives.
They show the nuns at prayer or at lunchtime, including Sister Rita’s exercises, for example. I recently acquired a pair of boxing gloves.
The nuns at Goldenstein Monastery have gained nearly 100,000 followers on Instagram and thousands more on Facebook.
The impasse lasted for nearly three months. The university’s rector’s spokesman, Harald Schaeffel, told the Austrian news agency APA that the nuns could remain at the convent for the time being.
The decision was made after a meeting at the beginning of the week in which the solution was proposed.
The nuns can remain in the monastery, according to Shevel, under certain conditions. One of them is to suspend your social media activities.
Catholic authorities also want the nuns to deny access to the closed part of the monastery to people who do not belong to the order.
In return, they will be allowed to stay and will receive medical and spiritual assistance from the priest.
credit, BBC/Bethany Bell
The nuns have not yet announced their agreement to these conditions. “Now, it is up to the sisters,” Shevel told APA.
The BBC contacted them looking for an answer.
The three nuns spent most of their lives at Schloss Goldenstein Castle, which was converted into a convent and private girls’ school in 1877. The school began accepting boys in 2017 and is still in operation today.
Sister Bernadette herself taught at the school. She arrived as a teenager, in 1948.
One of his colleagues was Vienna-born actress Romy Schneider (1938-1982), who became one of the world’s biggest film stars in the 1960s and 1970s.
Sister Regina arrived at the convent in 1958 and Sister Rita in 1962. All three taught at the school for many years and Sister Regina was director.
But the number of nuns decreased dramatically. In 2022, the Diocese of Salzburg and the Reicherberg Abbey, an Augustinian monastery, took over the building.
The dean of the monastery, Markus Grassl, became head of the nuns and the community was officially dissolved in early 2024.
The remaining nuns were granted the right to reside for the rest of their lives as long as their health and mental capacity permitted.
But in December 2023, the decision was made to move them to a Catholic care home, which made them unhappy.
At the beginning of September, Sisters Bernadette, Rita and Regina returned to the convent, with the help of a group of former students.
At the time, the nuns told the BBC that they were determined to remain in the monastery.
“Before I die in a nursing home, I would rather go to the meadow and enter eternity that way,” Sister Bernadette said.