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There has been major pushback from the Catholic community over the Los Angeles Dodgers’ decision to not only invite a blasphemous group of “nuns” to the baseball team’s annual “Pride Night”, but also to honour them with the Community Hero Award.

On Friday, June 16, the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus – an important feast day in the Catholic Church – thousands of Catholics gathered outside Dodger Stadium during the team’s pre-game pride celebrations.

Apparently necessary to these pride events is a “leading-edge order of queer and trans nuns”, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, who display vile and profane mockery of Catholicism and Catholic consecrated women.

The group claims it is not anti-Catholic but merely “satirises” the faith, yet these drag queens dress as nuns wearing flamboyant makeup; use the motto “Go and sin some more”, an insulting parody of Jesus’ words in John 8:11; and the group has had a long history of engaging in sexualised and blasphemous displays of Catholic imagery.

Public Response

The protest was organised by the Phoenix-based group Catholics for Catholics, where demonstrators held signs that said “Stop Anti-Catholic Hate”, “Sacred Heart of Jesus, Have Mercy On Us”, “Perversion is Nothing to Be Proud Of” and “Bud Light the Dodgers”.

But the “sisters”, who were recognised before the game for their “outstanding service to the LGBTQ+ community”, were met with a mostly empty stadium and a few boos from the crowd.

And, according to Savanah Hernandez, a reporter for the conservative youth organisation Turning Point USA, it may be unlikely that the drag group will be invited again for next year’s pride event.

“I spoke to a member of guest services and asked if the ‘sisters’ would be getting any more recognition or receive the Community Hero Award from the Dodgers on field. He shared that [as] far as he knows, this announcement is all they would be receiving and we’ll see no more of the ‘sisters’ tonight,” she said.

A Call to Prayer

Archbishop José Gomez of the Los Angeles archdiocese, along with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, encouraged Christians to pray for conversion and reparation in response to the Dodgers honouring the sacrilegious “nun” group.

A USCCB statement on June 12 read,

“This year, on June 16 — the day of the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus — a professional baseball team has shockingly chosen to honor a group whose lewdness and vulgarity in mocking our Lord, His Mother, and consecrated women cannot be overstated. This is not just offensive and painful to Christians everywhere; it is blasphemy.”

Archbishop Gomez offered a Mass and called for a day of prayer last Friday. He tweeted, “Join us today as we pray, in a special way, for our city and country, for an end to prejudice, and for renewed respect for the religious beliefs of all Angelenos and all Americans.”

Even the Dodgers’ star pitcher, Clayton Kershaw, spoke out against the team’s announcement in late May to invite the drag group to the Pride Month celebrations.

“I don’t agree with making fun of other people’s religions. It has nothing to do with anything other than that. I just don’t think that, no matter what religion you are, you should make fun of somebody else’s religion,” Kershaw said.

He then approached Dodgers management to counter the decision to invite the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence by relaunching “Christian Faith and Family Day”, which will be held at Dodger Stadium on July 30.

“For us, we felt like the best thing to do in response was, instead of maybe making a statement condemning or anything like that, would be just to instead try to show what we do support, as opposed to maybe what we don’t,” Kershaw said.

“And that was Jesus. So to make Christian Faith Day our response is what we felt like was the best decision.”

But does inviting the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence in the first place really show the Dodgers’ “support” of Jesus?

One can only hope that this will be a lesson for the Dodgers, and for other organisations from Bud Light’s Anheuser-Busch to Target to the NHL, all of which decided it was a good idea to alienate much of their customer base and run colourfully obtrusive campaigns in honour of a small percentage of the population. Oh, and at least for Bud Light and Target, lose billions of dollars in market value in the process.

However, inviting and honouring the “sisters” is far beyond an item on the woke rainbow agenda for Pride Month. Blasphemy is a different playing field.

Why is the ridicule reserved for Christians? The Dodgers and other organisations would not dare entertain a group parading around in hijabs and mocking Islam, or any other religion.

Yet, God calls us to “pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44), and amid modern society’s increasing hostility towards Christians, we remember His words – “If the world hates you, know that it hated Me first” (John 15:18).

So, even if we speak out or protest against the blatant mockery of the Christian faith, let us ultimately pray for the conversion of sinners, for “they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).

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Photo: John Samuel/Wikimedia Commons