Nun of the Above Trivia Quiz

Answer: Mother Teresa

Mother Teresa, born in 1910, devoted her life to helping the poor and disadvantaged, primarily in India. She started the "Missionaries of Charity" in 1950 which grew to have missions in 123 countries. After suffering through numerous physical ailments, Mother Teresa died in 1997.

Answer: St. Catherine of Siena

St. Catherine of Siena was born in 1347 and was the youngest of 25 children. At the age of 16, she became involved with the Dominican order. She devoted her life to helping the poor and died of a stroke in 1380. Catherine was canonized by Pope Pius II in 1461.

Answer: Katharine Drexel

St. Katharine was born in Philadelphia in 1858. Later, she traveled to the west with her family and was immensely impact by the terrible conditions the Native Americans were living in. She opened her first of many schools in 1887. She used her inherited fortune to fund the schools.

She established the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament in 1891 to which she remained devoted to until her death in 1955. Pope John Paul II beatified St. Katharine in 1988 and proclaimed her the Patron Saint of racial justice and philanthropists.

Answer: Alzheimer's

"The Nun Study" was useful in learning the process of aging and Alzheimer's. The advantage was having a large number of participants that all had the same living environment. The nuns also agreed to donate their brains after death so scientists could learn the differences between brains with Alzheimer's and those without. Scientist David Snowdon started the program and wrote a detailed book about the project called "Aging with Grace."

Answer: Elizabeth Ann Seton

St. Elizabeth Seton was born in New York City in 1774 and converted to Catholicism in 1805. Later, she organized the Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph in Maryland which became the first free school and apolistic women's community in the United States. She died in 1821 and was canonized by Pope Paul VI in 1975. Seton is recognized as the patron saint of Catholic schools.

Answer: St. Teresa of Avila

St. Teresa of Avila, also known as St. Teresa of Jesus, was born in 1515 in Spain. She joined the Incarnation of the Carmelites, a convent, in 1535. During a serious illness, she experienced a "religious ecstasy" and St. Teresa became a reformer of the church and established a number of convents. She died in 1582 and canonized in 1622.

Answer: American

Waddles was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1912. Her family moved to Detroit in 1936. During the 1940s, Waddles began religious study and became a Pentecostal minister. She devoted her life to helping the poor of Detroit and established the Mother Waddles Perpetual Mission in 1956. She died in 2001 but her mission lives on.

Answer: "Dominique"

Deckers hit the charts with "Dominique." It reached number one in the United States and was the first Belgian song to reach that level. Despite her instant success, Deckers was never able to have any other success in music. She had a troubled life after her fame faded and eventually committed suicide in 1985, at the age of 51.

Answer: Dolores Hart

Dolores Hart became a star in Hollywood, starring in ten movies from 1957 to 1963, including two with Elvis Presley, "Loving You" and "King Creole." In 1961, while filming "St. Francis of Assisi," Hart had an audience with Pope John XXIII. She left Hollywood in 1964 and joined a monastery, Benedictine Abbey of Regina Laudis, taking her final vows in 1970. Hart became the Prioress of the Abbey in 2001.

Ingrid Bergman and Audrey Hepburn both played nuns in the movies but never were real nuns.

Answer: False

While Catholic nuns are the most recognizable, other religious orders also have nuns including Buddhists, Taoists, Jains, Eastern Orthodox, Lutherans and Anglicans.