We are an order of 21st-Century nuns dedicated to the promulgation of universal joy and  the expiation of stigmatic guilt. Our ministry is one of public manifestation and habitual perpetration.
No more guilt!!

Our work exists on many levels: making people happy, stamping out guilt brought on by judgmental society, drag activism, helping various organizations and charities. Our core mission and commitment to our philosophy requires the ability to work with people and the desire to learn and grow. We are first and foremost nuns, gay nuns. We serve our community with faith and without judgment. We seek to uplift each person’s spirit. And we spend hours on our knees in obedient supplication. We even take vows. Usually vows of iniquity. Men and women from across the spectrum of the GLBT community join together, first as a Mission and then as independent house of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence to celebrate our gay identity in the unique manner in which we minister to the community. The decision to become a Sister is a fantastic journey and the efforts made came back again and again as a reward for the soul. By manifesting as a Sister, we receive as much as or even more than we give and discover parts of ourselves that we did not know existed or, perhaps, never recognized. The calling to be a Sister of Perpetual Indulgence allows one to know themselves better and find an outlet to express behavior and emotions that were shut down for fear of being different or criticized.
There it is – stigmatic guilt.

Freedom of Expression

Each person is an individual and each situation is unique. Each Sister of Perpetual Indulgence has a calling to work on behalf of others and a community that at times seems lost, fragmented and self condemning. By choosing the path of becoming a Sister, we become comfortable with our self expression as a nun in the persona of a Sister of Perpetual Indulgence. Using the experience and hope of the Sisters around the world, we find our way as a Sister in service to the GLBT community. All nuns do not love all other nuns. True in all other aspects of life also. It is the commonality of purpose and the acceptance of a broad range of opinions that allow us to do our sacred work with creativity and self-expression.

Diversity

We are family. “Family” means freedom to be an individual in a close-knit group of individuals. We are far from perfect and like many families, often have our misunderstandings. Despite that, when we all work towards our common goals, miracles can and do happen.There is room for a lot of fun in the Sisters, but we take our vows very seriously and feel a genuine calling to do this work so that the commitment never waivers. We feel no need to separate or discriminate different people into separate affiliated organizations. In fact, to do so would be hypocritical and contrary to our statement of purpose. Being a Sister is one of the most challenging and demanding things an individual can ever do. It requires skills that many never knew they had as well as an investment in time, energy and money. It also takes drive, passion and a desire to perform community service. It requires the ability to handle many tasks with grace and humor, honesty and genuine character; good people skills and the ability to interact with other in a meaningful way. But that isn’t all. Being a Sister offers rich and enduring rewards that make propel us to do even more.

Social Activism

Inherently, by our very nature, we are inescapably agents of political change. Some members wish to identify only with the social service or spiritual aspects of the order, but there is no escape from the controversial and political qualities of being a Sister and taking actions affecting various social issues The activist tradition of the Sisters spawned in the early years demanding funding for AID’s research and education as well as care of those struck down with what was then a terminal illness was again demonstrated with the burning of the Pope in effigy during his 1987 visit to the US. While viewed as extreme and heretical in mainstream society, when the Pope denounced gays as immoral and a blight against God and Jesus, the Sisters took a stand against the absolute rejection and condemnation that is the official policy of the organized Catholic church. We believe that hate and discrimination must be confronted in any of its forms and whenever it appears. Institutionalized prejudice, however it manifests, belittles the human spirit and berates the human soul. We do not judge, we celebrate any and all expressions of the human experience and believe that there is room for everyone to express themselves fully without harm to any other. It was only 30 years ago that the Gay Liberation Front took to the streets refusing to continue to hide and demanding basic human dignity. We marched into the streets yelling, “I’m here. I’m queer. And I’m not going away.” We kept doing it until the politicians and the medical establishment paid attention to all the men dying around us every day. In 1980 the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence authored “Play Safe” the first sex positive educational guide available to continue living in the midst of an epidemic that took thousands of lives. The Sisters continue this activism in everything we do and by simply being. We are out, we are proud and we celebrate the gift of being gay. lesbian, bisexual, trans-sexual and trans-gendered.

Social Service

Ours is a ministry of “presence”. We do all that traditional nuns have done for centuries. We are 21st-century nuns, free from guilt associated with many traditional religions. The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for AIDS and other social causes that continue to afflict not only the GLBT community but the lives of young people, men and women in every aspect of life. With HIV and AID’s again on the increase, STD rates exploding, crystal meth use creating co-existing dependencies that defy treatment, and difficult to diagnose MRSA infection, the work of the Sisters is continues to be as important today as it was when the first epidemic ravaged our community. We do not condemn. Our ministry is life affirming and sex positive. We visit the sick, educate and promote safer sex and, through service the community, bring enlightenment and hope.

Spiritual Development

There is a great freedom within SPI to discover and express various qualities, aspects and spirituality an individual may feel. We educate and promote safer sex practices because part of self-love is respecting and taking care of yourself. Also, by our very appearance, we reintroduce to the community the spirit of “other”, and of the shamanic sacred fool that is the Drag Queen’s historical role in society. If there is room for us to look like we do, then there is room for every gay , lesbian and trans-gendered individual to be who and what they are without the institutionalized shame, guilt and degradation assigned our GLBT people by society. Egoism that leads to bitchy and uncooperative impulses within permeates our past and tends to continue today in many aspects of gay culture. As a Sister, we step out of ego and focus on things bigger and more important than our self interest. In addition to the very serious work we do, the Sisters provide fun, laughter and levity as well as a premium sexual outlet for aficionados of grease paint and pubic glitter.

Commitment

Becoming a Fully Professed Sister of Perpetual Indulgence is not an easy journey. It is not supposed to be. It requires fortitude, humility, tremendous desire and the ability to listen, observe and learn. As with all nuns, priests, clerics, shamans, Brahmins, and other holy individuals around the world, there is inherent and immense amount of self-sacrifice. Sisters may not always agree with each other on a particular direction that the House is pursuing, but we are expected to work for the good of the group and the community. Many times since the founding of The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, nuns and guards have made personal sacrifices so that SPI would reap the full benefits of their efforts. Each individual has performed mundane but necessary services to the Sisters, participated in functions that they would not normally care to attend, and given up some of their personal freedoms so that the group would flourish, or even participated with the group though they were in poor health or physical pain.

Courage

There are over 600 Sisters around the world with twelve orders and three missions in the United States joined by another 22 houses in nine countries. Through world domination, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence strive to free the human spirit and celebrate the unique form that spirit takes in each of us. As a   Sister, we carry the remarkable dedication and inspiration of every Sister in our hearts to give us strength as we follow the path that other Sisters have followed since 1980. Sisters that have gone before and fell in the battle with the epidemic. The challenges our community faces today are different but yet they are the same. As a Sister, we choose to join all Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence to be out front and celebrate our unique gift of gayness and to keep the issues we face in front of those who sometimes forget that we are still a minority whose protected rights still do not universally include the ability to live and love in the same manner as the heterosexual majority. It is our calling to keep pushing, to keep walking forward. Just don’t get your high heels stuck in a crack in the sidewalk


This is what it means to a Sister within the sanctuary Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence…

To support and advance the freedom of self expression and all inherent human values of all GLBT persons.

To serve the GLBT community in achieving social, economic, and political equality.

To explore and express the attributes and unique gifts given to me as a GLBT person by my Higher Power with the hope of learning not only to accept myself but love the person I am.