The Roman Catholic Church has launched an investigation into vents leading to two missionary nuns becoming pregnant while on missionary works in Africa.
The two nuns belong to separate religious orders in Sicily and are expecting their children despite their vows of chastity.
One of the nuns who is a mother superior found out that she was several weeks pregnant while the second nun discovered of her pregnancy when she complained of stomach pain.
They now under pressure to resign from the religious life with the scandal causing ‘consternation’ among the clergy.
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One of the nuns who is 34 discovered her she was pregnant when she went to the hospital over stomach pain, according to the Italian news agency, ANSA.
Her religious order has not been identified, but reports say she belonged to a convent in Sicily’s Nebrodi mountains. She has now moved to Palermo to prepare for the birth of her child. The nun may now choose to give up her monastic life altogether and focus on raising her child, it is believed.
In a second case, a nun who was originally from Madagascar was discovered to be several weeks pregnant. The nun was a mother superior – a senior monastic – and had been caring for the elderly at an institute in Ragusa.
She has already returned to her home country, according to reports, but the double scandal has caused concern among the church hierarchy.
‘There is consternation at this news,’ a church source in Rome, where the Catholic Church has its headquarters. ‘
It appears that both women were back in their home nations and obviously had some form of a sexual encounter.
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‘An investigation has been launched. They both breached strict rules of chastity but the welfare of their children is uppermost.’
Earlier this year Pope Francis admitted that many nuns had been sexually abused, calling it a ‘serious, grave problem’.
‘We have to fight this, and also the service of religious sisters: Please: Service yes, servitude no,’ he said on his papal plane in January.
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