Amid sky-high prices for just a single room in New York City, living among nuns is becoming increasingly popular.
Average rent prices in the city have already jumped by almost $150 in 2026, sitting at just under $3,700 per month for June.
'It was the cheapest place I found in Manhattan.'
Rent could get as high as $4,000 by the end of August, trends on Zillow show, a long way from where studio apartments or even two-bedrooms were in 2021: $2,000 and $2,600, respectively.
In the face of these prices, New Yorkers are reportedly filling up residences run by nuns, who offer cheaper prices but require tenants to adhere to a stricter set of rules — a polar opposite of New York City free-for-alls Americans saw during the NBA Finals, for example.
The Wall Street Journal reported on five different nunneries in New York that offer housing at a third of the price, or less, of the average NYC apartment. St. Agnes Residence on the Upper West Side starts at about $950; Centro Maria in the Bronx charges about $800; and St. Mary’s Residence on E 72nd St. is around $1,200 per month.
One former renter at Sacred Heart Residence in Chelsea, named Katie, paid $1,650 for her spot.
"Nuns are awesome," Katie told the outlet. "They be chilling."
Hannah remarked that the Menno House, a 10-person residence in Gramercy Park, had its smallest room listed for $580/month.
"It was the cheapest place I found in Manhattan," she said.
Cheap rent is not all the nuns are offering, either.
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At Centro Maria, five nuns live with 21 residents in a four-story building. The benefits of this show up in the form of a daily morning breakfast for the residents cooked by the nuns, including pancakes, eggs, sausage, fruit, and more.
The nuns not only clean the building, they host parties for residents to intermingle and even have karaoke in the dining room.
There are rules, of course, offering some stability to residents in the crazy city. Some had a reported curfew of 11 p.m. or midnight, while women's residences bar male visitors from bedrooms, as well as alcohol.
"I love living with the girls. They keep me young," said a Sister Rita. But as loving as the nuns can be, they are also strict, and they're not hiding it.
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One convent has a display board in the lobby that lists who is home and who is out; the nuns say they lie awake until everyone is home.
"I don't go to bed if I don't know where someone is," Sister Maria says. If a girl is late for her curfew — which she has likely informed her nuns of ahead of time, possibly out of fear — Sister Maria lies down and waits. The nun said she typically thinks, "I'm gonna kill her tomorrow," and then gets up when the door opens.
Sister Maria also conducts surprise room inspections twice per month.
"You don’t know the date, but I'll be there," she reportedly said with a smile.
As for Sister Rita, who loves her girls, she said that she vets any boyfriends who are brought to the building and tells the girls to their faces if she doesn't like them.
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A group of Catholic nuns in New Jersey, who, among other things, work to assist those struggling with addiction, may soon have a pot shop open up next door to their convent.
The Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal is an order of Catholic sisters that began in the Bronx in 1988. In 2017, the order opened its first American convent outside New York City: the St. Michael Convent in Atlantic City, New Jersey. "The sisters live at St. Michael’s Convent and have a drop-in center for the homeless next door to St. Nicholas Tolentine Church," a website for the convent reads.
As many in the area struggle with alcoholism and other forms of substance abuse, the sisters regularly host sobriety meetings at the convent, as well as other classes for teens in need.
Despite the sisters' devotion to God and to serving the poor and downtrodden, a government board determined to make Atlantic City the cannabis capital of the East Coast may soon impede their noble work. The Casino Reinvestment Development Authority, which is tasked with planning and development in Atlantic City, has approved applications for two new cannabis dispensaries, including one just 150 feet from St. Michael's Convent.
At a hearing on November 2, three nuns from the convent voiced strong opposition to a new dispensary in the area. "I’m actually Dutch," said Sr. Joseph Van Munster, "so I grew up in a country where marijuana was legalized, and I’ve seen a lot of things over the years."
Sr. Joseph then explained that legalized marijuana requires a strong police presence, which Holland has. By comparison, police response times in Atlantic City can be slow, she said, and the city is already plagued by illicit drug use. She also expressed concerns that a pot shop would negatively affect kids in the area as well as those in addiction recovery.
Other neighborhood residents expressed similar concerns about the proposed shop's proximity to the church. The shop would take over an old dry cleaning business that has closed.
Lance Landgraf, the director of planning and development for the CRDA, chuckled about the nuns' unusual appearance at the hearing. "I’ve never had to swear in a nun before," he claimed.
Landgraf insisted that he shares some of their concerns about the growing number of dispensaries in Atlantic City and that he has discussed them with members of the CRDA. However, he also noted that though there is a prohibition against opening dispensaries near schools, there is no legal prohibition against opening them near churches.
Members of the Chelsea Baptist Church learned that firsthand over the summer when they objected to a dispensary opening about a block from their church. The CRDA voted to approve that dispensary anyway. "They don’t want them anywhere near the casinos, but they don’t care where else they go," Pastor Tom Weer said in September.
As it has in most cases, the board voted to approve the application for the dispensary near the convent, following the lead of Mayor Marty Small Sr. and his administrative team, who seem to believe cannabis will be an economic boon for Atlantic City. "My focus is to make Atlantic City great, to make Atlantic City the East Coast hub for cannabis," said Kashawn McKinley, the city’s cannabis czar.
Neither the sisters nor the CRDA responded to the New York Post's request for comment.
Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal: Our Life youtu.be
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A Catholic advocacy group is running ads during every Los Angeles Dodgers game this week, calling out the team for its endorsement of anti-Christian bigotry.
In the lead-up to the team's Friday presentation of a "Community Hero Award" to the so-called Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, CatholicVote is also deploying mobile billboards to expose the group's degeneracy and anti-Christian bigotry.
The ad that CatholicVote is running during the games is entitled "The Dodgers Have Lost Their Way." It has already been seen over 1.4 million times on YouTube.
The ad notes the Dodgers weren't always synonymous with bigotry, highlighting a memorable occasion on which the Dodgers took a meaningful stand against prejudice: when the team signed Jackie Robinson, the first black American to play in Major League Baseball. The ad contrasts that bold move in 1947 with the team's recent decision to celebrate an anti-Christian activist group.
"Playing Jackie wasn’t popular. Hate and disrespect were popular, even in law. But the Dodgers were right. They helped power a movement and changed a nation. Their leadership, class, and style of play were the envy of baseball. The Dodger way," says the ad. "But today, the Dodgers are putting it all at risk."
"On June 16, a prominent anti-Catholic hate group will be honored on the field: a group that mocks Catholic nuns with vile sexual perversions, pole dances on crosses, blessings with sex toys, even sexualizing the Virgin Mary and the words of Jesus Christ," continues the narration. "A fringe group like this honored, awarded, celebrated? There is no equality in mocking women religious. No tolerance in hate. No pride in anti-Catholic bigotry. Mocking Christians is not the Dodger way."
The TV ads will run during the Dodgers' pregames, postgames, and the games themselves on the Los Angeles network that carries them.
The Dodgers Have Lost Their Way youtu.be
CatholicVote indicated that as part of its $1 million ad campaign, it will run mobile billboard trucks outside the stadium all week displaying "disturbing images of SPI and a quotation from a Christian Dodgers player who publicly disapproved of the team’s decision to honor the group."
There are now two players on the team whom the advocacy group can quote, plus a Nationals player who has been particularly outspoken.
TheBlaze previously reported that Clayton Kershaw, a Methodist, was the first of the Dodgers to speak out, saying, "I don’t agree with making fun of other people’s religions."
Dodgers pitcher Blake Treinen similarly took a stand against his team's decision to honor the SPI, stating, "I am disappointed to see the Sister's [sic] of Perpetual Indulgence being honored as heroes at Dodger Stadium. Many of their performances are blasphemous, and their work only displays hate and mockery of Catholics and the Christian faith."
The 34-year-old from Wichita, Kansas, added, "This group openly mocks Jesus Christ, the cornerstone of my faith, and I want to make it clear that I do not agree with nor support the decision of the Dodger's [sic] to 'honor' the Sister's [sic] of Perpetual Indulgence."
The two were joined in their criticism by pitcher Trevor Williams of the Washington Nationals, who called on his "fellow Catholics to reconsider their support of an organization that allows this type of mockery of its fans to occur."
"Inviting the Sister's [sic] of Perpetual Indulgence to perform disenfranchises a large community and promotes hate of Christians and people of faith. ... People like baseball for its entertainment value and competition. The fans do not want propaganda or politics forced on them," Williams said in a statement.
In addition to confronting Dodgers fans with discomfiting facts about the SPI outside Dodger Stadium, CatholicVote has also deployed billboard trucks outside the league's Manhattan headquarters.
According to Tommy Valentine, director of the Catholic Accountability Project at CatholicVote, the ad agency behind the trucks rejected one display because the SPI's acts depicted thereon were too vile.
"It goes to show the importance CatholicVote’s effort to hold the Dodgers and MLB accountable," said Valentine. "The group they’re honoring is not just hateful and bigoted – they’re so obscene that self-respecting companies don’t even feel comfortable displaying their disgusting behavior."
Valentine noted that as part of the campaign, CatholicVote is "also running a Spanish-language ad on L.A. Spanish radio stations and geotargeted digital ads and text messages to baseball fans in L.A."
While the team celebrates its 10th annual LGBTQ+ Pride Night inside the stadium Friday, outside, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops noted the Catholic Church will instead celebrate the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
The USCCB said in a statement, "This year, on June 16 — the day of the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus — a professional baseball team has shockingly chosen to honor a group whose lewdness and vulgarity in mocking our Lord, His Mother, and consecrated women cannot be overstated. This is not just offensive and painful to Christians everywhere; it is blasphemy."
Accordingly, Timothy Broglio, archbishop for the Military Services, Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, and Archbishop José H. Gomez of Los Angeles called on the faithful to "recognize June as the month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus" and commended efforts by Christians and "others of good will" to take a stand.
Several other American bishops have denounced the team and league over the decision to honor the SPI, including Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, who stated, "There are more than 4 million Catholics in Los Angeles, and the decision by the Dodgers to invite a group that seeks to openly disparage them, and the millions of Catholics around the world, is abhorrent and should be rescinded."
Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City said, "I encourage the management of Major League Baseball to not allow baseball to be used to advance ideologies that are offensive to many of their customers. Please allow baseball fans to enjoy America’s past-time [sic] without having to be subjected to blasphemy and the mockery of the deeply held religious beliefs of many of its players and fans."
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco tweeted, "Our Catholic sisters devote themselves to serving others selflessly. Decent people would not mock & blaspheme them. So we now know what gods the Dodger admin worships. Open desecration & anti-Catholicism is not disqualifying. Disappointing but not surprising. Gird your loins."
LifeSiteNews indicated that Christians will be rallying, protesting, and praying at parking lot 13 outside Dodger Stadium at 4:30 p.m. Pacific Time.
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