Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Religious sister (Catholic)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 04:31, 4 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Religious sister (Catholic)[edit]

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POV-pushing. An earlier discussion on Talk:Nun went to a consensus not to do difficult about the small distinction between Nuns and religious sisters. But here the author effectively hijacked a redirect to push his POV. Now that he was caught red handed, he moved it to another title. Still there is no need to separate this from Nun. The Banner talk 14:36, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions. Dom from Paris (talk) 14:48, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect to Nun and eventually merge anything that isn't already there. As it says on that page "The new legal code of the Catholic Church which was adopted in 1983, however, remained silent on this matter. Whereas previously the code distinguished between orders and congregations, the code now refers simply to religious institutes.". If the Catholic legal code groups them as one and the same who are we to go against the Holy See? Dom from Paris (talk) 14:57, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep. @The Banner: Which "earlier discussion on Talk:Nun" are you referring to? The discussions there had to do rather with renaming the Nun article, here and here. In the latter, note the support for adding a separate article such as the one here which you propose for deletion.

And @Domdeparis:, the Code of 1983 did not presume to decide the question of who will be called nuns and who will be called religious sisters except for always referring to "monastery of nuns", never monastery of sisters. They are all religious institutes, which is a generic term, but that doesn't mean that those inside the institutes are not distinguished as nuns, sisters, monks, brothers, friars,... . Note the pivotal statement in the lead: "When bound by simple vows, a woman is a sister, not a nun." Jzsj (talk) 15:12, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The source that you added [1] seems to be a little confusing because it says "For example, the Visitation Sisters are technically cloistered nuns but teach school" From what I can gather it has a lot to do with when the institute was created. I may be wrong but those belonging to the institutes etablished after the Fifth Lateran Council take simple vows and those belonging to the older institutes take solomn vows but they are basically the same because they all "take the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience; live in community in a convent; and share in a particular apostolate." As it says in the sources sisters are called nuns and nuns are called sister by the general public and there are orders of nuns who are known as Sisters. There seems to be no legal difference now because if we can believe Solemn vow "...under the 1917 Code solemn vows rendered a subsequent marriage invalid, but simple vows only made the marriage illicit, the current Code of Canon Law states that "those bound by a public perpetual vow of chastity in a religious institute invalidly attempt marriage" and "Renunciation of the right to own property is now a matter for the constitutions of the religious institute in question and is associated not with the solemnity of the vows but with their perpetuity. " As both simple and solemn vows can be perpetual the same rules apply. So apart from the name what is the real difference if there is no legal difference and some nuns can work like sisters and very few orders remain cloistered? I would say there is not enough material to warrant a WP:SPINOFF and the actual state of affairs with a section that explains the difference is enough. Dom from Paris (talk) 16:27, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The arguments you raise show that things are in transition, as the 1983 Code acknowledged, but not that religious sisters, who are currently doing apostolic work and don't live in a monastery, want to be confused with monastic nuns. They usually don't, as the lead of the article on Religious sister (Catholic) makes very clear. As those who wish to be known as sisters, not monastic nuns, almost always call themselves "sister" on their website and in their Wikipedia articles, we should respect that and not link them to an article on nuns. This was proposed by several persons in the discussions on the Talk:Nun page, and still remains valid. Jzsj (talk) 16:39, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This can be explained in the Nun page. I would suggest that if you feel that the title is in some way injurious to either sisters or nuns then you should make a move request WP:RM#CM. Here you are making some pretty general assumptions about what many many thousands of women want and you are taking an advocacy stand and trying to right great wrongs. This is an encyclopedia we also work as a community and it is the community that decides. --Dom from Paris (talk) 16:54, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Aren't you making the assumption that in calling themselves' "sister" that they would just as soon be called nun. And you seem to be ignoring the great emphasis on the distinction in a couple sources in the lead. I trust that we will wait for fuller community participation in this discussion, that affects so many women and informs the public on possible confusion of Catholic sisters with monastic nuns, as distinguished by the Code of 1983. Jzsj (talk) 17:05, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Jzsj, are you familiar with WP:Battleground and WP:POINT? It may be helpful to you to read those two articles. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 17:35, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Women-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 17:24, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments: This particular article does not warrant speedy-deletion. It is far better sourced than comparable content in the Nun article where the Nun#Distinction between a nun and a religious sister is discussed. There is perhaps a bit of original research in the final paragraph where states the 1983 Code mentions "nun" in passing (and/or states that the 1983 Code is silent on the matter), however this issue also exists in the Nun article. Even if the 1983 Code eliminates the formal difference, the prior distinction may still be historically notable. Arguments about whether sisters object to being grouped with nuns must be well sourced (references to "respecting" self-identification on the order's websites constitutes original research). However, the deletion of the article must rest on whether the sources adequately assert that "religious sisters" are notably distinct from nuns. – 23:09, 27 August 2018 (UTC) Additional Comment: There are comparable articles for Munk, Friar, Religious brothers that may aid in discerning whether Religious sister is notably separate from Nun. –Zfish118^⋉talk 17:09, 30 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your helpful comments. I'd ask, is the number of links to Religious sister compared to the number of links to Nun in Wikipedia (assuming that this is a part of the stored data) admissible as evidence to justify giving sisters their own article, not a subsection of the nun article? I read at WP:OR that: "This policy of no original research does not apply to talk pages and other pages which evaluate article content and sources, such as deletion discussions or policy noticeboards." Can this not be used as evidence on this deletion page, and if so how might we access that statistic? I do agree with your last sentence, that the clinching arguments should be like those in the lead that point out the ongoing distinction between sister and nun. Jzsj (talk) 00:11, 28 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It would depend whether you can show that the context in the originating article demonstrates that the outbound link was targeting the specific topic of Catholic religious sisters, and not women religious in general. It would have to be a significant number of links for the argument to carry weight. The raw number of inbound links is not useful without the context of the originating article. –Zfish118^⋉talk 16:53, 28 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The point would be that there are hundreds of sisters and sister's congregations that prefer to call themselves sisters, and so be linked to sister rather than to nun (which is not what they call themselves). Jzsj (talk) 17:03, 28 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I am concerned about what a reader would expect when clicking the link to "religious sister"; would they expect the full article discussing women religious, and the place of active congregations within that context, or just the narrowly focused article here. –Zfish118^⋉talk 02:43, 29 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

As the lead to this article makes clear, most sisters do not expect to be discussed under the title of "nun", which has always and still does suggest the monastic, not the active life. Like in so many articles, for those who wish to learn more about sisters, I would suggest moving some of the material on Nun/Christianity/Roman Catholic to here with briefer coverage there, as it presently serves as a summary article with redirects under Buddhism, Eastern Orthodox, and Anglicanism; Catholicism also deserves a redirect to a more ample article, where the United States and Canada could be included with their present redirects. These articles can only grow over time, and it's due time to use the Nun article as more of brief directory to a much larger group of articles. One might also reopen there the question of including "sister" in the title, considering what is learned here on the separate history of the term. But I don't see further extending the Catholic coverage at Nun when it already greatly exceeds that of other groups there. Jzsj (talk) 04:40, 29 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. The sources sem quite clear about the distinction, especially historically. DGG ( talk ) 02:03, 28 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Strong keep. As already stated above, there is a clear distinction. Also, to be honest, I am surprised that this article is being nominated for deletion. Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia. It is to explain the complexity and diversity of the world, not generalise it. Grouping all vowed religious women together as nuns or as a subset of nuns is not recognising the complexity and diversity of this world. In addition, the words used to explain why this article was proposed seem to be more concerned with the person creating the article than the article itself. Pjposullivan (talk) 09:25, 29 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Keep As poster above. The subject seems to merit its own article and is well explained and sourced XyzSpaniel Talk Page 19:56, 29 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Keep The distinction is discussed in secular academic sources, eg [2]. — BillHPike (talk, contribs) 23:41, 29 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I found similar distinctions in scholarly work as Billhpike. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 04:57, 31 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Keep as there is enough independent coverage in reliable sources to pass WP:GNG, regards Atlantic306 (talk) 18:33, 1 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Nuns and sisters appear to be different things. In addition to what has been said already, one finds sources expressly denying that they are the same thing in unambiguous language: [3]. Even if I was wrong about this, deletion would still not be appropriate for a plausible redirect with mergeable content. James500 (talk) 07:06, 2 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.