LA Pride has pulled out of an annual Pride Night hosted by the Dodgers after the team disinvited a non-profit drag group from the event.
Earlier this week, the Los Angeles Dodgers rescinded an invitation to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a well-known San Francisco order of queer and trans “nuns” that has existed since the 1970s, amid opposition from conservative Catholics. The group, which does does charitable and protest work in addition to its street drag show performances, was set to receive an award during a ceremony before a 16 June game against the San Francisco Giants.
“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 that we have seen over the years of Pride Night, we are deciding to remove them from this year’s group of honorees,” the Dodgers said in a statement on Wednesday.
In response, LA Pride said Thursday that the group was “very disappointed” in the baseball team’s decision and would no longer take part.
“As a result and in solidarity with our community, LA Pride will not be participating in this year’s Dodgers event,” the organization said in a statement. “Pride is a fight for equality and inclusion for the entire LGBTQ community and we’re not going to stop now.”
The controversy took off when Senator Marco Rubio, whom the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign has described as “one of the most anti-LGBTQ+ politicians in America”, wrote to the MLB commissioner earlier this week criticizing the team’s decision to honor the order, which he claims mocks Christians. Leaders of conservative Catholic groups also contacted the MLB arguing that it was “rewarding anti-Catholicism”.
For their part, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence said they were “offended and outraged” by the team capitulating to “hateful and misleading information” from those targeting the LGBTQ+ community.
The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence first appeared in San Francisco in 1979 in the Castro District in the form of three men wearing nun outfits. The group formed in response to the Aids crisis and was among the first to raise money to help care for people with the disease, it said in a statement. Today they fundraise hundreds of thousands of dollars each year for underserved grassroots organizations, which in 2020 included grants to legal aid clinics serving LGBTQ+ asylum seekers and an alliance empowering deaf queer people, among others.
The group’s mission statement says the non-profit is devoted “to community service, ministry and outreach to those on the edges, and to promoting human rights, respect for diversity and spiritual enlightenment”.
“We use humor and irreverent wit to expose the forces of bigotry, complacency and guilt that chain the human spirit,” according to the group’s website.
Over the decades, it has grown into a number of loosely organized chapters around the world that engage in protest and charitable work.
Opponents, however, urged the Dodgers to retract their decision to honor the group on the grounds that it mocks the Catholic faith.
The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence said the group is not anti-Catholic, but an organization “based in love, acceptance and celebrating human diversity”.
“Do not let people who hate us all decide that some parts of our community are more tolerable than others, that some shall be seated at the table while others are locked out.”
