The recent story featured by Times of Malta (May 23), on the closure of the Crèche at Sliema, brought quite a heartwarming response: tributes to the selfless service of the Ursuline Sisters over the last century with the forgotten children of our society brought also good wishes for the new venture being prepared by the nuns. It also brought to the light for a brief moment the countless lives of dedicated religious women and men given in total service for others.
The article on the closure of the Crèche shed a light on the invisibility of this small, ageing and generally declining population. With the advent of services provided by the state and other agencies that have gradually replaced the works of religious in hospitals, prisons, residential and elderly care, and education, a quiet appreciation is emerging: many of these peoples have worked for free, saved the state and the Church millions, and truly given their lives completely in service; a veritable army of free (or cheap) labour in many of the earliest forms of social services with the most needy in Malta. The oft quoted quip is that it takes between three to five full-time workers to replace a nun’s work.
Beyond the generous platitudes and praise, the truth is that religious, particularly female religious in Malta, remain largely invisible in pastoral planning. This is partly due to a very poor understanding of the true calling of religious life in the life of the Church on the theological and diocesan level. The fact that demographically they are an ageing and disappearing group also contributes to dismissing female and male religious as irrelevant in today’s Church.
Recent research I took part in showed a rapidly declining population of nuns in Malta – 701 at the start of 2021, with less than 10 per cent under 50 years of age, and over 45 per cent of nuns aged over 80. In a decade, a handful of female religious congregations will have disappeared from Malta.
To add insult to injury, some of these older nuns, and in some cases, male religious, do not have a pension. How many people know that a missionary who has spent a lifetime of service in missionary countries or with Maltese migrants is not entitled to some type of pension?
To add insult to injury, some of these older nuns, and in some cases, male religious, do not have a pension
In Malta there is a particular provision whereby for every 10 years spent in voluntary work abroad, a person is entitled to five years of credited national insurance contributions. But the devil is in the detail: for this to be triggered, the person has to have had at least 10 years of contributions to his or her name. Some of these nuns and missionaries left Malta in their 20s, returning to retire often aged 75 and over. In the case of nuns who have always stayed in Malta and have toiled in kitchens, laundries, old people’s homes, schools and monasteries, without earning a dime for decades, the same happens. For these, there is no credit, no recognition.
It is true that workers of the Gospel seek no reward, but even a token adjustment to our pension schemes could go some way in acknowledging an anomaly that perpetuates the concept that nuns and male religious work for free and remain invisible for society even when they get older.
Beyond the platitudes, is our society gracious enough to ensure that, like every other citizen, the later years of religious who have given so much, are given due and tangible recognition?