- Reverend Mother: I can feel you, right next to me, for so long. With me all that time, my darling husband. And now you've abandoned me! And you hoped that I would lose faith in you? You imagined that I would just walk out those gates? I cannot. I made a commitment forty years ago. And even if you choose to turn your light from me forever... I am yours. Oh, my darling husband.
- [singing Exodus 4:15 repetitively]
- Nuns: You shall speak to him / And put the words in his mouth / And I will be with your mouth / And with his mouth / And will teach you both what to do.
- Sister Cathleen: [narrating] They think of nuns today and they see a bunch of old women. Women, who couldn't find husbands or for some reason just couldn't make it in the outside world. So, they ran off to a monastery to escape everything. What they don't understand is that beneath everything else... we were women in love.
- [whispers to God]
- Sister Cathleen: You're all I could ever want.
- Reverend Mother: Any questions?
- [One girl raises hand]
- Reverend Mother: Put your hand down, sister. Postulants don't have questions and you are free to go home.
- Reverend Mother: The memos sent over from your office used the word "suggestion" in regards to all these changes we're suddenly...
- Archbishop McCarthy: [laughs] Well, that's amusing. I think you're the only one to miss the subtext there. You see, for most of us, the word "suggestion" is understood as synonymous with "obligation".
- Reverend Mother: Perhaps I'm not all that attuned to subtext.
- [Puts her right fist to her chest and bows]
- Reverend Mother: My apologies.
- Reverend Mother: I do understand how difficult it can be for a parent to give their child to God.
- Nora Harris: And that's because you have children of your own?
- Reverend Mother: No, I don't. But neither do you anymore.