Lesbian Nuns (12 of ???): an Irish-American nun (4 of 5).

From “Healing in the Dark” – Mab Maher (1956-1974; 289-290) -

One year before I left the convent I took a leave of absence to do consultation work in the East... Luckily my friend Sarah taught me to look carefully at society’s expectations... During those first few months I learned how much inverted interest there is in the lives of nuns. Sarah taught me to treat questions as projections and to have fun with them.

A few weeks later a man with whom I worked asked me over lunch if there were underground tunnels between rectories and convents for easy access to sex. I said, “Sure.”

“But isn’t that awfully dangerous? You could be found out.”

“Oh yes,” I assured him, “that did happen.”

Two weeks later he called to confide that he had been having an affair with his neighbor’s wife. There was a secret path in the adjoining orchard. But he had been found out!

When a woman asked me if nuns masturbated, I said, “Sure.”

She was shocked but interested. “I suppose it did help a tense situation.”

“Oh, of course.”

A few weeks later at the swimming pool I overheard her say that she and her husband were again having sex. She attributed this marvel to her newly discovered joy in masturbating.

Perhaps all this was not exactly what Ghandi [sic] had in mind when he spoke of experimenting with the truth, but I was learning who I was not and how easy it is to be caught in the web of projection.

. . .