Kerala convent shuts door on ailing \’activist\’ nun
Ananthakrishnan G, TNN
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Sister Teena Jose first hit the national headlines two years ago, successfully contesting the Bar Council of India\’s objections to nuns enrolling as advocates. Unfortunate though, the 55-year-old is now in a state of pain and misery, allegedly abandoned by the church that she served for 35 years.
On June 4, she was admitted to a private hospital in Kochiwith multiple injuries. She had fallen off accidentally from the bus. “Doctors advised that I could be discharged on June 27 after some stitches were removed. But the Rani Matha convent district where I belong to refused to take me back”, she said sobbing. The convent is run by the Congregation of Mother of Carmel (CMC) sisters. Their excuse: she had applied for going out of the church and it was granted. But Teena claims there is more to it.
There is a history to the ill-will for Teena who had sided with the nuns of the Little Flower Convent, which too is located in Ernakulam, over the rights of the convent and a school run by it.
Early this year, there was a spat between the nuns and the vicar of St Mary’s church in which a nun was brutally assaulted. Police had registered a case against the vicar. The attack jolted Teena and she took it up with church superiors.
“Once while discussing this, a senior priest made a mention of the Orissa incident where a nun was raped and said that our problem was nothing of that scale and hence could be sorted out easily. I still don’t know what that really meant,” Teena said.