Derry nun Sister Clare Crockett shocked her friends when she told them "with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other" that she was going to the nunnery.
A recording has emerged of Sister Clare talking about her wild teenage years and her developing drink problem before entering a convent.
Efforts are continuing to bring the young nun’s body home after she was killed in an earthquake while teaching in Ecuador. In a candid account, Sister Clare (33), from Derry’s Brandywell, talks about her "clubbing" lifestyle as a teenager.
She also tells how her manager - she was a budding actress who had presented children's television for Channel 4 and Nickelodeon - had pleaded with her to return.
The recording was made for the Catholic church’s World Youth Day in Spain in 2011 and recounts her journey from wild teenager to nun. While Sister Clare spoke in Spanish, her words were translated and posted on the website of her Order, the Home of the Mother this week.
She recalled being the “class clown” while at St Cecilia’s college in Derry.
“I always imitated the teachers. I didn’t go do my homework. Other people did it for me and I would give them cigarettes in exchange.”
She recalled going clubbing in Derry from a very young age and fearing that she was developing alcohol problems.
“Ever since I was about 12 or 13 years old, I was already going to clubs and in a bad environment. So by the time I was 17 years old I already had a problem with alcohol. A pretty big problem,” Sister Clare said.
She said the major change in her life started when she went on a pilgrimage to Spain, originally believing she was signing up for a fun holiday in the party island of Ibiza.
She took part in the Good Friday Veneration of the Cross ceremony because everyone else did and it was while kissing the feet of Christ on the Cross that she felt a “strong blow” as if God was speaking to her. Despite this she resisted, believing her life would be destroyed.
“Before I had everything, a ton of friends, a boyfriend, money, fame (from an emerging acting career), people telling me that I was really getting somewhere; that I was great. I had a manager always patting me on the back telling me I was going to go far in life and, in spite of all that, I felt a huge emptiness inside of me that nothing could ever fill, nothing,” Sister Clare said.
The second time she felt God speak to her was while in a nightclub.
“I was in the bathroom, sick and about to vomit because I drank so much that I didn’t know when to stop,”
The Derry nun said she felt “God’s gaze” and felt God was saying “Why do you keep hurting me?” Later while filming in England, Sister Clare said she decided to dedicate her life to God by entering the Home of the Mother Order of nuns. However, when she told her friends and family back in Derry, they didn’t understand.
She said: “I said I was going to be a nun but I said it with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other.”
Having made her decision, Sister Clare said she knew she had to leave Ireland and her old life behind.
