The past five years have been marked by an increased awareness by the Catholic Prelates as to the precarious state of lay and religious members of the Catholic Community. With this renewed look at the Catholic Church, structure has been modified, and with it special problems have arisen. Three brief case histories of nuns are presented. The intention is not to describe in detail the psychoanalytic treatment, but to attempt to understand why this particular type of patient has now enlisted the help of psychoanalysis.

I have attempted to demonstrate that although a source of motivation for entering treatment was intrapsychic conflict, permission to enter treatment came from the Ecumenical Movement. The Ecumenical Movement has permitted the religious person to feel that a new identity and