Labour MP Blasts Nasty Comments After Monastery Announces It’s Bringing In Filipino Cloistered Nuns
Labour MP Silvio Parnis has hit out at people who posted nasty Facebook comments in reaction to the news that a Valletta monastery is bringing in three Filipino nuns to ensure it remains afloat.
“I started reading the comments, and if only you knew how many professors there are in this country, people who know everything and ready to speak about it,” Parnis said on the F Living Show this afternoon. “Let’s be careful what we say because everyone hurts.”
Madre Mikelina Mifsud from the Monastery of the Augustinian cloistered nuns of St Catherine in Valletta told ONE that while the convent used to host over 60 active nuns, there are now only four elderly ones.
They have therefore decided to bring over three nuns from the Philippines to bolster their ranks.
“These three nuns will come here and settle here… if they aren’t Maltese, they can be Filipino – what’s important is the monastery, especially the Augustinian cloister, remains open in Malta,” she said.
Warning that “spirituality is sorely lacking” in Malta, Parnis said he knows firsthand how people facing social problems would often resort to nuns for help.
“These are people who need faith or are passing through tough times… someone going through a cancer operation, a woman who can’t give birth, a mother whose son overdosed…”
Madre Mifsud has noted that the modern world has seen a major decrease in new nuns and all religious vocations are struggling to find new blood.
“Nowadays, it’s not easy to say you are becoming a cloistered nun.”
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