Drag nuns in the outfield? Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence invited to Angels’ Pride Night

The mayor of Anaheim has invited the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a longtime charity organization made up of queer nuns often in drag, to the Angels’ Pride Night next month — after the group was recently snubbed by the Dodgers.

The Los Angeles chapter of the nonprofit group was supposed to be honored with the Community Hero Award at the Dodgers’ Pride Night on June 16, but the Dodgers decided to retract that invitation. The Times reported last week that the team’s decision came a day after the Dodgers and the Major League Baseball commissioner’s office were targeted by email campaigns from conservative Catholics objecting to the group.

In a statement, the Dodgers said they removed the group from Pride Night “given the strong feelings of people who have been offended by the Sisters’ inclusion in our evening, and in an effort not to distract from the great benefits … of Pride Night.”

But that move has done the opposite of limiting distractions, instead drawing intense backlash from elected leaders, fans and LGBTQ+ groups across the region, including several organizations pulling out of the Dodgers’ Pride Night festivities at Dodger Stadium.

Anaheim Mayor Ashleigh Aitken tweeted Saturday that she was among those upset by the Dodgers’ decision and invited the Sisters to the Angels’ Pride Night on June 7.

“Pride should be inclusive and like many, I was disappointed in the Dodgers decision,” she posted on Twitter, using the hashtag #CityofKindness.

It wasn’t immediately clear if she issued an official invitation to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence beyond the tweet or if the group would be honored in any way at Angels’ Pride Night. A spokesperson for Aitken declined to answer questions, saying there were no updates available.

The Sisters also didn’t immediately respond to questions about the invitation Monday morning. A spokesperson for the Angels declined to comment.

The Sisters, who describe themselves as a “leading-edge Order of queer and trans nuns,” said in a statement that they were deeply offended and outraged by the Dodgers’ decision for the team’s 10th annual Pride Night.

“The Dodgers capitulated in response to hateful and misleading information from people outside their community,” Sister Rosie Partridge, president and an abbess of the San Francisco Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, said in a statement. “Our ministry is real. We promulgate universal joy, expiate stigmatic guilt and our use of religious trappings is a response to those faiths whose members would condemn us and seek to strip away the rights of marginalized communities.”

The group has for decades used drag, satire and charity to support the LGBTQ+ community and other marginalized groups.

But some conservative Catholic groups and leaders, including Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, had protested the Dodgers honoring the work of the L.A. Sisters, calling them anti-Catholic.

Partridge called that notion completely false, noting the group’s origins during the AIDS crisis to provide money, care and safer-sex information to primarily gay men who had been otherwise outcast by much of society, including religious leaders.

We are “an organization based on love, acceptance and celebrating human diversity,” Partridge said. “… Sisters are regularly called upon to minister to the sick, the dying and the mourning.”