What’s black and white and faces riot cops?

Evicted nuns, that’s who! No, not the ones in Santa Barbara, or the other ones from the Army of Mary, or even those feisty Italian nuns, but rebellious, Polish nuns! It’s turning into a regular “Nuns Gone Wild: International Edition” year.

Updated: 2:31 a.m. PT Oct 11, 2007

KAZIMIERZ DOLNY, Poland (AP)- Police evicted 65 rebellious ex-nuns Wednesday from a convent they illegally occupied for two years after defying a Vatican order to replace their mother superior, a charismatic leader who had religious visions.

The defeated nuns walked out in their black habits — some carrying guitars, drums and tambourines — after a locksmith opened the gate to the walled compound and police in riot gear rushed in and arrested the mother superior. A former Franciscan friar who had locked himself away with the nuns also was taken into custody.

Several nuns, many of whom appeared to be in their 20s, screamed at police, calling them “servants of Satan,” as they were escorted out and into waiting buses.

“They were disobedient,” said Mieczyslaw Puzewicz, a spokesman for the Lublin diocese of the Roman Catholic Church. The Vatican formally expelled the women from their Sisters of Bethany order last year, but has revealed almost nothing about the dispute.

About 150 police in riot gear went into the compound to find the ex-nuns defiantly singing religious songs and playing instruments, Puzewicz said. Lublin Archbishop Jozef Zycinski called the police operation a last resort meant to help the ex-nuns.

Well, that’s an interesting approach to “helping.”

Mother Jadwiga is a charismatic figure who claimed to have religious visions and was reportedly attempting to transform the convent into a contemplative order. The Lublin diocese hinted at that portrait in a statement on its Web site that said: “Mother Jadwiga’s private revelations, and the fact that she made it a guideline to stick by them, caused unease to the Congregation.”

The Vatican, which has authority over all convents, has traditionally been wary of people claiming visions, in part fearing others could be drawn in. When the Vatican formally expelled the nuns from their order in 2006, the women refused to leave the convent and cut themselves off from the outside world.

The church eventually sought legal action to remove them, and a court in nearby Pulawy ordered their eviction. The convent’s electricity was cut off earlier this year, but sympathetic local residents secretly funneled them food at night.

Aww! The underground nun railroad!