How many nuns could live in a nunnery?

Answer 1

In the 2008 US Catholic demographic census there were found to be 59,208 religious sisters serving in the USA. This is a stark contrast to a mere 40 years ago when there were over 175,000 religious sisters.

Answer 2

729,371 are recorded by Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae 2011, which includes data up to 2009.

According to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University, as of 2010 there were 721,935 religious sisters worldwide.

Strictly speaking, not all sisters are nuns, but the statistics include all women in monastic, mendicant, secular or apostolic communities, which are commonly all referred to as sisters.

Answer 3

The latest figures we have are for last year, and include a total of 54,018 Religious Sisters world-wide. Please note that this includes all sisters, not just nuns. Nuns only make up a fraction of that, but as most people assume that Sisters and Nuns are the same thing, you might be asking for that figure anyway. Catholic nuns are strictly cloistered usually, you don't see them out on the streets, they remain in their monasteries. The Sisters that one usually thinks of, teaching school, nursing the sick, working in the parish are Sisters not nuns.

Answer 4

Catholic AnswerNot nearly enough, and their numbers continue to fall, although there is light at the end of the tunnel, things are turning around. An excerpt from the attached website; this is from a report published in 2008, using figures from 2006-2007; I am assuming that you mean "women religious" by nuns, actually nuns are only women who live full time in a monastery without outside work, and under solemn vows, a small fraction of the total women religious, who are mostly sisters not nuns, although laypeople tend to use the word nun indiscriminately:

The number of members, predominantly women, some engaged only in constant prayer, others working as teachers, health workers and missionaries, fell 94,790 to 945,210.

Of the total, 753,400 members were women, while 191,810 were men, including 136,171 priests and 532 permanent deacons.

The figures were published next to a report of Pope Benedict XVI's meeting with nuns, monks and priests from many countries gathered in St Peter's Basilica in Rome last weekend.

Answer 5

Nunneries can range from a small home housing two nuns to a complex of building housing hundreds if not thousands of nuns.

Answer 6

The nuns were the continuation of the Vestal Virgins of ancient Rome. They began shortly after the Vestal Virgins were disbanded in 394 AD. See link.

Answer 7

18598 in 1969