Susan Mattern is a Southern California-based speaker and the author of Poverty, Chastity & Disobedience: My six years in a Catholic convent and Out of the Lion’s Den, her memoir about a mountain lion attack on her 5-year-old daughter, Laura Small, in an Orange County park in 1986.
POVERTY, CHASTITY & DISOBEDIENCE
My six years in a Catholic convent
Susan Mattern had no problem with most of the vows when she entered the convent. Poverty was easy. She didn’t have any possessions, joining the convent directly from high school. Chastity was no big deal since she hadn’t ever met a boy she liked. But obedience? That was a problem, especially when the rules made no sense. READ MORE >>
OUT OF THE LION’S DEN
A little girl’s mountain lion attack, a mother’s search for answers.
“Out of the Lion’s Den” is the true story of five-year-old Laura Small’s attack in an Orange County, California park.
But it’s not only the story of Laura’s long recovery from brain injuries.
Her parents soon realized that the attack wasn’t just the result of a lone mountain lion. Early morning anonymous phone calls, erasures on police reports, and a California moratorium on killing lions, led a persistent investigator and a brilliant lawyer all the way to a trial against Orange County for negligence. READ MORE >>
“Poverty, Chastity, and Disobedience by Sue Mattern is insightful, delightful and revelatory. Each chapter is a story of Mattern’s experiences in religious life in the late 1960’s, a time of incredible change in the Roman Catholic Church.”
“The depicted daily life of a religious postulant is sometimes shocking, and you find yourself rooting for the author and her partner-in-crime Pam to find a way to break out of their monotony and exert some individuality.”
SUSAN’S BLOG
The Garden of Second Chances
I love gardens. I wish mine looked like the "Secret Garden" in the movie, with its climbing roses, vines and daffodils, but I've come to appreciate the succulents and bougainvillea of Southern California. The thing I like best about gardens is that they always give...
Istanbul
Rick Steves, the travel expert, wrote an editorial in the LA Times last year. His message was: "Afraid of terrorism? Get on a plane!" We are so bombarded by reports of terrorism that we forget that most people are just like us –– not just in the U.S., but all...
Empty Nest?
My birds have gotten out of hand! I seem to be on the edge of ecological disaster in my backyard –– too many nests and species all crowding together. When my children left home, never to return –– as children ought to do –– I did feel like an empty-nester. But...
How does an atheist get through a traumatic experience?
I had been a Catholic my whole life, and a nun for six of those years. It wasn’t until a mountain lion attacked my 5-year-old daughter, standing next to me in a stream, and almost killed her, that I wondered for the first time whether there was really a God. Once I asked that question, there was no going back.
How Do You Define Yourself?
Who are you? How do you define yourself? Some people can combine what they love and what they do. Teachers, photographer, lawyers, or artists. Others are defined by what they have to do to make a living. Are you defined by what you do or love—or by what happens to...