Pop star Rosalía spends an entire album cycle dressed in a white veil and nun’s habit for Lux, an album inspired by saints and mystics. Sydney Sweeney plays a pregnant nun in the film Immaculate. In her summer hit, Annalisa is part nun, part porn star. Rihanna has embraced the look, too, as has Lily Allen, who appears in a nun’s habit in the music video for “Pussy Palace,” cigarette in hand, legs crossed and black stilettos on her feet.

These stars are bringing an aesthetic that blends the sacred and the profane to the stage and screen. And because everything needs a label, a term emerged in 2022 to describe the phenomenon, which has taken off especially on social media, with TikTok leading the way: nuncore, a mashup of “nun” and “hardcore.”

There is nothing entirely new about it. Think of the B-movies of the 1970s known as nunsploitation, set in convents populated by “troubled” nuns, to put it mildly. “In the 1970s, when nuns appeared in cinema or pop music, their bodies were eroticized. It was a way to play with censorship and challenge the norms of the time, which were deeply patriarchal,” says David El Kenz, Professor of Modern History at the University of Burgundy who has studied the subject.

What distinguishes today’s trend from its predecessors, beyond its irreverent aesthetic, is its message. The provocation challenges one of the most enduring tenets of patriarchal thinking: that a woman must be either a saint or a whore. She is a saint if she wears long skirts and high necklines, but the opposite if she dares to wear a miniskirt or show her midriff. There is no need to revisit the recent controversy over remarks by Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani suggesting that a wife’s reliability could be judged by the length of her skirt.

Today, the pop world’s fascination with convent imagery has become a form of resistance and rebellion. It asserts the freedom to be “saintly” without submitting to a punitive dress code — but also the right not to be sexy simply to satisfy male desires, amplified by the digital world. In this context, covering up becomes a radical new act of defiance.

Madonna helped pave the way, repeatedly appropriating the image of the nun to challenge religion’s moral authority and its control over women’s bodies. What a Le Monde investigation dubbed “nun mania” is therefore more than a passing trend. It carries a clear message about independence, emancipation and, increasingly, spirituality.

To explain the phenomenon’s popularity on social media, Le Monde also points to a “thirst for religion” among younger generations in France. One sign may be the growing number of baptisms: the French Bishops’ Conference says 21,000 young adults and adolescents are expected to be baptized in 2026.

Italy tells a different story, although some dioceses, including Milan’s, have seen more people — especially young people — drawn to the Church and its sacraments. The appeal of spirituality may offer an antidote to a world that seems to have gone mad. But it also reflects the Church’s efforts to adapt to the digital age and find new ways to reach younger generations with its message.

The number of nuns is declining, but women religious still outnumber male religious. The latest figures put their global total at 580,000, compared with 407,000 men in religious orders. Falling vocations affect much of the world, though the picture varies by region. The number of women religious is rising in Africa but falling in Europe, the Americas and Oceania. Even Asia, where their numbers had grown for years, is now seeing a decline.

Those who take religious vows today often do so as adults, bringing a wealth of life experience with them. Many continue their studies and earn degrees. They have hobbies; some teach mathematics, while others are film buffs who attend the Venice Film Festival and never miss a movie.

Forced entry into convent life is a world they know little about. Yet they share some symbolic traits with the nuns of centuries past: rebellion, resilience and a desire to find alternative ways to make themselves heard. The internet has opened a window onto religious communities of all kinds, both male and female.

One of this year’s breakout stars is Nayiby Jimenez, a member of the Congregation of the Daughters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. Since 2012, she has lived in a community residence in Raiano, in the province of L’Aquila, which provides care for older nuns and those who are no longer able to live independently. On Facebook and Instagram, she created the accounts “Suore Ravasco Nayiby” and began posting reels in which the home’s oldest residents share their stories with disarming simplicity and a healthy dose of humor.

More than 320,000 people follow them. They are the 21st-century “influencer nuns,” or “smart sisters,” as Donne, Chiesa, Mondo, the women’s monthly magazine published by L’Osservatore Romano, calls them. The magazine has been directed for the past seven years by Rita Pinci.

An investigation in the magazine explored how women religious are “finding new ways to be present in the world, tell their stories beyond stereotypes, communicate their faith and respond to changes in society,” Pinci says. “They are extraordinary. They are knowledgeable and confident, they know how to use technology, and they adopt a fresh, informal language to speak to young people. They use memes, aphorisms and glittery markers.”

There are plenty of examples. Sister Rosa is active on X under the handle @Rosa_monaca, where she posts daily novenas while also sharing her passion for Napoli soccer club. She is the abbess of Naples’ Monastery of the 33, where Matilde Serao set her novel Sister Giovanna of the Cross. She also writes the book column for Donne, Chiesa, Mondo.

A devoted fan, she comments on matches, congratulates players and makes no effort to hide her frustration when things go badly.

These days, even cloistered life is cloistered in name only. There is a whole world beyond the convent grille.

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