N
naprous
Guest
Interesting thread. Before I’ll add my 2 p., I’ll say that I am an academic and also a former Benedictine novice.
As an academic, I once participated in a conference with a lovely Franciscan friar, whom I needed to contact about a manuscript after the fact. So I wrote him as “Father Lastname,” trying to be polite. He was mortally offended! And he wrote back telling me that I absolutely had to call him simply David.
My experience in the mixed monastery I lived in in France was that everyone went by first names: the brothers (who were all priests) were either Père André or just André, and the nuns were Soeur Marie-Thérèse or just simply Marie-Thé. I find it very odd to call monks or priests by their last names!
And then there’s my friend Dave, a Jesuit I went to grad school with. Jokingly, I call him Dr. Father Dave – but in real life, I just call him Dave…
Just as with any adult, I would prefer to ask, because I know there are some people who are offended by too much informality. My mother is as offended to be called by her firstname and lastname (i.e., Mrs. Jane Doe, as opposed to Mrs. John Doe) as I am to be called by my husband’s name.
I’ve been a high school teacher, and have been called by my first name at two schools, and by my first name at another. Now that I’m a college professor, I go by Professor Lastname – but I know that a lot of my students call me by my firstname behind my back…
naprous
As an academic, I once participated in a conference with a lovely Franciscan friar, whom I needed to contact about a manuscript after the fact. So I wrote him as “Father Lastname,” trying to be polite. He was mortally offended! And he wrote back telling me that I absolutely had to call him simply David.
My experience in the mixed monastery I lived in in France was that everyone went by first names: the brothers (who were all priests) were either Père André or just André, and the nuns were Soeur Marie-Thérèse or just simply Marie-Thé. I find it very odd to call monks or priests by their last names!
And then there’s my friend Dave, a Jesuit I went to grad school with. Jokingly, I call him Dr. Father Dave – but in real life, I just call him Dave…
Just as with any adult, I would prefer to ask, because I know there are some people who are offended by too much informality. My mother is as offended to be called by her firstname and lastname (i.e., Mrs. Jane Doe, as opposed to Mrs. John Doe) as I am to be called by my husband’s name.
I’ve been a high school teacher, and have been called by my first name at two schools, and by my first name at another. Now that I’m a college professor, I go by Professor Lastname – but I know that a lot of my students call me by my firstname behind my back…
naprous