For three days from Feb. 24 until Feb. 26, approximately 200 Catholics gathered outside St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York to pray the rosary in reparation for an “LGBT pride” funeral that took place there a week and a half earlier.
The prayer rallies were organized in conjunction with one of two petitions that called upon New York’s Cardinal Timothy Dolan to take firm action against those who allowed the “sacrilege”—celebrating things that the Catholic church considers to be “seriously immoral”—that have gathered tens of thousands of signatures.
The Feb. 15 funeral was for “gender-confused” man Cecilia Gentili.
Before it began, a picture of him dressed as a woman, with a halo around his head and inscribed with words including “transvestite,” “blessed,” and “mother” was placed near the sanctuary and surrounded with flowers as though in veneration of a saint.
A member of the congregation sang “Ave Cecilia” to a well-known Catholic tune of “Ave Maria” (“Hail Mary”).
The presiding priest, Father Edward Dougherty, spoke of him as a female.
High-profile media coverage was immediate.
St. Patrick’s rector, Father Enrique Salvo, took two days before issuing a public statement saying: “The cathedral only knew that family and friends were requesting a funeral mass for a Catholic, and had no idea our welcome and prayer would be degraded in such a sacrilegious and deceptive way.”
He added: “At the cardinal’s directive, we have offered an appropriate mass of reparation.”
In response to Father Salvo’s statement, funeral organizer Mr. Ceyenne Doroshow told The Washington Post that he informed a member of the cathedral staff that Mr. Gentili was “a sex worker advocate, an icon, and an activist” and that more information could easily be found online.
Withholding Mr. Gentili’s gender confusion did nothing to obscure the expected lewd tone of the event.
A source close to the cathedral and unfamiliar with that report assured The Epoch Times it would have been unlikely for the funeral to be scheduled without “negligence or complicity.”
However, Father Dougherty said he was not aware that Mr. Gentili was a man.
When contacted by The Epoch Times he stated that he only learned of this fact when someone asked him why he was referring to Mr. Gentili as a female. He responded that Cecilia is a female name and was then told that Mr. Gentili had begun to use the name as part of his “gender transition.”
Father Andrew King, the cathedral’s liturgical master of ceremonies, could not be reached but multiple sources believe he was unaware both of Mr. Gentili’s gender confusion and that an “LGBT pride” funeral was planned before the congregation arrived.
But a video recording shows that once aware of the congregation’s intentions, neither priest attempted to cancel the funeral, turn off the cathedral audio system, or call upon the cathedral’s security guards or the police to intervene.
Father Dougherty joked that it was unusual for the cathedral to be so full except at Easter and acted as though largely satisfied with what was taking place.
Father King helped direct the proceedings—though he appeared to do so with reluctance and regret—and, according to a source, played the decisive role in downgrading the funeral from a mass to another form of service.
In Catholic theology, this reduces the degree of sacrilege without eliminating it.
Following such an event, it would be normal for the diocesan bishop, in this case, the cardinal, to offer a mass of reparation that would be highly publicized beforehand.
Priests who permitted such a sacrilege often face disciplinary action and possible removal from their duties.
These standards were followed as recently as November 2023 in the nearby Diocese of Brooklyn after a lewd music video was filmed in one of its churches. The pastor responsible no longer has administrative oversight over the parish.
Cardinal Dolan chose to “outsource” the mass to another priest and not to advertise it beforehand.
On the day Father Salvo’s statement was released, Mrs. Wendy Long—a devout Catholic lawyer who lives in the archdiocese—had an opportunity to speak to Cardinal Dolan after he offered a mass at New Rochelle’s Blessed Sacrament Church.
When she questioned him about the mass of reparation, she said he told her he deliberately kept it low profile.
An employee of a local diocese—who does not work in New York itself but knows several priests there—added that the cardinal did not personally communicate with his clergy about the matter, he instead instructed his vicar general to forward Father Salvo’s statement to them.
During a regular podcast on Sirus XM’s The Catholic Channel, Cardinal Dolan said that the priests “acted extraordinarily well” by preventing the greater sacrilege of an “LGBT pride” mass.
Cardinal Dolan referred to Mr. Gentili as a “woman” and referred to him using feminine pronouns in the same podcast.
By Feb. 18, Catholics disappointed with what they called the tepidity of archdiocesan responses began organizing calls for the large-scale and highly publicized acts of reparation normal under the circumstances.
One of two petitions posted online that day by the popular Life Site News website called for an exorcism to be performed at St. Patrick’s.
It gained 9,000 signatures in approximately 48 hours and that number has increased daily to more than 16,000.
The other had more than 25,000 as of Feb. 23 and was formulated by The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family, and Property (TFP)—an organization of Catholics that coordinates activism, devotional events, scholarship, journalism, and education.
The rosary rallies at St. Patrick’s were an initiative of TFP subdivisions American Needs Fatima, which promotes devotion to the Virgin Mary, and Student Action.
John Ritchie, head of Student Action, explained that there are three basic reasons for the rallies—“to make reparation to God for terrible sacrilege,” “asking God for conversion in America,” and “asking Cardinal Dolan to lead more public forms of reparation.”
The Epoch Times approached other officials of the diocese on several occasions by phone but did not receive a response by publication time.
