taking sides (Full coverage of ongoing Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence situation)

Via Thomas Peters, we learn that the cross-dressing Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, two of whom received communion from the hand of Archbishop George Niederauer on October 7th, have posted a facetious press release concerning the incident, headlined "Sisters Upset Communion Being Turned into Political Issue." The press release quotes the "abbess" of the gay agit-prop group, who calls herself Sister Edith Myflesh.

The moniker "Edith Myflesh," it goes without saying, makes reference to John 6:54 (in its King James Version), "Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life." The disdain conveyed by the flip allusion to Jesus' Eucharistic teaching, compounded by the lewdness of the sexual double entendre, points to a hatred of Christianity that borders on frenzy.

The intensity of the gay-activist antipathy as well as its target of choice is displayed with exceptional clarity in the Drag Nuns Communion incident, and the reactions to the incident highlight the fault-lines along which the U.S. Church is split. One might think gay-friendly moderates would cringe at the flamboyance of drag-queen activism and the belligerence of the Sister Edith sacrilege, but in fact the reproaches come exclusively from the conservative side of the aisle, while the progressivists seem unable to grasp what all the fuss is about. Some have hesitantly conceded that the Sister Act was "inappropriate" -- as if the dispute hinged on the etiquette of church-going -- but the general liberal consensus seems to be that anything that antagonizes the Catholic League must be on the right track and worthy of defense.

Deplorable though their stuntmanship was, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence may, contrary to their intent, perform a signal service for orthodox Catholics and for the Church at large. Think back to the 2005, and the in-fighting surrounding the upcoming Doomsday Doc, eventually issued as the Vatican Instruction on "Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies." The controversial point was the Holy See's contention that homosexual men lack the "affective maturity" necessary to the spiritual paternity in which the priesthood is authentically lived out. Remember the delegation sent ahead of time by the U.S. bishops begging that the Instruction be shelved? Remember the squeals when it was issued all the same? Remember the gasps of indignation at its statement that homosexuality was a "disturbance of a sexual nature ... incompatible with the priesthood"?

So picture a priest or bishop working in the Vatican curia who lived through the Doomsday Doc warfare and the arguments back-and-forth. And now on his office computer he's got a video-link to the Mass at Most Holy Redeemer. "Deep-seated homosexual tendencies are objectively disordered," he recites to himself, watching adult men in mascara and nun-drag given communion by a U.S. archbishop, "Got that right." No screed, no treatise, no series of lectures could make the point more memorably.

Will it make a difference, concretely? Not in the short term. The majority of U.S. bishops, remember, was trained in a theological culture that views the Sister's principal lapse as "over-accessorizing." Blasphemy (little different from heresy in this respect) is treated as a quaint, 19th-century sort of sin, the censure of which would be as comically obsolete as a treatment for dropsy or St. Vitus Dance, and few churchmen speak ill of the objective disorder in whose service the blasphemy is uttered. We can expect few efforts to tackle the current scandal. But the post-Conciliar ecclesiastics are passing away, and their successors are bolder where they're wrong and bolder where they're right. By putting their real motives on open display, Sister Edith and her pals have helped shape the terms of the conflict for the next generation.

Hmmm... that one does have that sixties Native American spirituality pagan vibe AND a labor-union concept of communism... I mean communalism...

But nothing irritates me more than a bunch of English-speaking songwriters trying to convince Americans that there’s something more authentic about Latin-American worship, and, therefore, we all need to sing musical selections from “Dora the Explorer.”

(Try teaching kids that “Dora” doesn’t rhyme with “explorer!”)

Don’t Spanish people get offended by their culture and worship being substituted by songs for those with room-temperature IQs (And I mean Celsius, thank you)? I know the Spanish people I’m friends with do, but I’ll acknowledge that they may not be exactly representative.

Standing up and shouting, “No! You will not do this!” just simply isn’t something one does during mass, especially when the appellate authority (the archbishop) is the one permitting it.

I understand that, and it's a serious thing to interrupt mass. But I keep wondering what it would take for someone to break with decorum, tradition, etc. and take a stand, because this was sacrilege. What's worse, to interrupt mass by saying "No!" or to sit there and let this horror take place?

1) Recall my tale of the "Columbus Day" protesters .... and their summary removal from Mass. Although that was more a matter of taking action to end a disruption, than it was of causing one.

2) On precisely ONE occasion, I have simply left the "service" (the priest was butchering the order of the Liturgy so badly as to render it "invalid").

3) I've never personally witnessed this sort of horror ... and it seems to occur in places that are already so corrupt as to more or less preclude anyone interrupting it. These creeps tend to be cowards. IMO.

I agree... But what is a congregant going to do? Tackle the queens and wrestle the bread from them? I’m not sure I agree with mob rule as a means of enforcing liturgical reverence. Don’t forget: it looked until the last moment like the bishop WAS going to merely give a blessing instead of the Eucharist. And this certainly is a parish where most of orthodox worshippers certainly fled eons ago.

sandy -

Don’t give up e-mailing! I’ve e-mailed several things to the Apostolic Nuncio with a CC to the Holy Father. Every once in a while, I get an Outlook message that the e-mail has at least been opened and read. I seem to have better luck when e-mailing in the evening, around 9 or 10 p.m. They are usually read in the morning around 8 or 8:30 Maybe it goes to the top of the stack? I will say that it seems that stories from a newspaper have a higher likelihood of getting read than from a blog. I usually type the headline of the story in the “Re:” line, then link to the story first, without comment. I put comment under the story link.

We need to keep up the pressure! It doesn’t really matter too much whether they actually read the e-mails - just knowing that we are outraged enough to send them should send a pretty strong message.

I would suggest that we all send e-mails. We need to bombard them with evidence that we know what is going on and that we aren’t going to stand for it anymore.

As a reminder to all:

Holy Father: benedictxvi@vatican.va

Apostolic Nuncio: nuntiususa@nuntiususa.org

The chances are slim, actually. There are very few bishops in this country with the spine to withstand the ravaging onslaught of the homosexuals, the MSM and - sad to say - a significant portion of their own uncatechized flocks. Archbishop Niederauer is definitely not one of those few.

However, that an interdict of the parish (maybe even the archdiocese itself) and a suppression of the parish should take place cannot be denied. If Rome gets wind of this, maybe something concrete will happen, though I doubt an interdict will result (maybe Niederauer will be called to Rome and ordered to grow a set immediately for future contingencies). Nevertheless, Benedict is clearly less tolerant of the abuses that his predecessor put up with, and I think he is slowly buiilding his foundational strength to take up with the heretics and apostates head-on.

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