Stop exploiting nuns for cheap Church labour: Vatican magazine

VATICAN CITY: A Vatican magazine denounced widespread exploitation of nuns for cheap or free labour in the Roman Catholic Church on Thursday, saying the male hierarchy should stop treating them like lowly servants.

The article in the monthly "Women, Church, World", remarkable for an official Vatican publication, described the drudgery of nuns who do work such as cooking, cleaning and waiting on tables for cardinals, bishops and priests.

The article, based on the comments of several unnamed nuns, described how some work in the residences of "men of the Church, waking at dawn to prepare breakfast and going to sleep once dinner is served, the house is in order and the laundry cleaned and ironed".

It said their remuneration was "random and often modest". In many cases, the nuns, who take vows of poverty, receive no pay because they are members of female religious orders and are sent to the residences of male Church officials as part of their assignments.