Could you provide support for the transsɛҳuąƖ nun claim?

It's true.  A few years ago, Mark Shea dragged it all out in the open again in his blog - to take the side of the transgendered 'nun'!  

I found the blog post where I first read about it:

Monday, October 21, 2013

Catholic blogger shoots first, asks questions never...
Mark Shea does it again, worst blogger in the world status remains secure.

Mark headlines his post:
Reactionary Layman Successfully Defends Church from Wounded Sinner Seeking God

Woah.  Sounds awful.  Is it true?

Well...

Over a decade ago, Mary Therese Helmueller, a nurse in Wisconsin, went over her Bishop's head and wrote to the Nuncio about a situation in her diocese.  A person she claimed was a man posing as a woman was set make religious vows as a nun.  

The Bishop in question was Raymond Leo Burke.
The nun was 'Julie' Green, who Mary Helmueller said was in reality Joel Green.
The order was the Franciscan Servants of Jesus.

Here's where it gets fuzzy.  Predictably, the nuncio just sent Helmueller's letter to Burke, and Burke responded to it thusly:

"With regard to Sister Julie Green, F.S.J., the recognition of the association of the faithful which she and Sister Anne LeBlanc founded was granted only after consultation with the Holy See," he writes. "These are matters which are confidential and do not admit of any further comment.... I can assure you that Sister Julie Green in no way espouses a sex change operation as right or good. In fact, she holds it to be seriously disordered. Therefore, I caution you very much about the rash judgments which you made in your letter to the Apostolic Nuncio."

So...was Helmueller wrong, and Sr. Julie was really a woman and able to take vows as a religious sister?  What were the 'rash judgements'?  

AMDG, the maganzine of Roman Catholic Faithful, reported it like this back then:

TRANSsɛҳuąƖ NUN IN WISCONSIN DIOCESES

In January, 2003, a concerned parishioner from St. Paul, Minnesota notified us that a transsɛҳuąƖ (man to woman) had been a religious Catholic sister for 18 years, ten years in the Milwaukee Diocese under Bishop Weakland in a women's Franciscan order. Then in 1993 this transsɛҳuąƖ nun went to the LaCrosse Diocese under the Bishop and received permission to found his/her own religious Catholic Women's Order called "Franciscan Servants of Jesus". On October 4, 1997 Bishop Raymond L. Burke elevated the order and was going to hear the final vows of Sr. Julie Green (Joel Green) on November 23, 2003.

The concerned parishioner sent copies of all papers that had been collected on Sister Julie to various authorities in Rome, but received no reply. Finally, the parishioner went to Rome and only when publicity was given to the case, was any action taken by the Church. Bishop Burke commented in a letter dated January 27, 2003 that unfortunately the situation had been publicized, denied that Sister Julie became a nun or was the mother superior of the religious order, and that such a person has been unable to emit valid vows except to the sex of his or her birth".

So...it seems that Burke admitted that Helmueller was right, and that what he was attempting to do was impossible.  And,of course of course, it started under Weakland.  

So, Mark, do we care at all about the truth?  Or that Bishops don't hear impossible vows from people?  Or do we just care about feelings?  Oh, sorry, I should know that based on THIS feelings are all that matter.

So, in the end, 'sister' 'Julie' Green left the Church.  After, apparently, living as a 'nun' for 18 years.  He apparently became a Pentecostal and went somewhat crazy.  Why did it all happen?  Was it all Helmueller's fault?  Why is Mark Shea so damned good at shooting the messenger?  

I submit that this person, Joel/Julie, had a pretty good gig, living quietly, perhaps invisibly, among nuns for a long time.  I'm not sure if 'no one ever bothered him', but it certainly seems that way.  What changed?  Well, he and Sister Anne LeBlanc (and actual woman, afaik) undertook to form a new religious order.  It is variously described as "for women" or "for transgendered".  Who knows.  What we do know is that a Catholic in the diocese thought it was fishy, and apparently her concern was well-founded according to Rome and, eventually, even Bishop Burke.  Burke apparently suppressed the order himself in the end.

Why did Burke call Joel Green 'she' in his response to Helmueller?  Who knows.  Was Burke even fully aware of the story?  Who knows.  Was someone at the Vatican trying to quietly push this transgendered agenda and got caught red-handed?  Who knows!  What we do know is simple - What Burke and Joel Green were trying to do is canonically impossible and in the end it was admitted.  A lay person pointed this out.  For this, Shea shoots her repeatedly.  

I'm sure this was a traumatic experience for Joel/Julie.  Sounds like a traumatic life in general.  But in typical Mark Shea blunderbuss fashion, he gets the heroes and villains all mixed up.  If Joel/Julie were an opposite transgender, a woman posing as a man after surgery, and the Bishop announced that he was going to ordain her to the priesthood, Helmueller would have been a hero, even to Shea.    

As it is, because Shea has little respect for organizations of religious, or their vows, or anything other than his personal hobby-horse of tolerance, he has dubbed Mary Helmueller the villain, driving poor Joel/Julie away from the arms of Christ.  No.  I submit that it would have been a tragedy on many levels if Burke had attempted to receive vows from Joel/Julie as a nun (a foundress even!), and so, so much worse for Joel/Julie and the Roman Catholic Church.  There are worse things than hurt feelings, even fatally hurt feelings.  

In the end, we have a bad situation in which we cannot know all the details, but what we do know leads to at least a very strong suspicion that Mary Helmueller prevented something awful.  I'd title the blog post "Catholic layperson takes unpopular stand for truth, is pilloried by Shea".

Agree?  Then do something about it.  Email Tom Wehner at the National Catholic Register at twehner@ewtn.com and ask him if the opinions expressed in Mark's article reflect the mission of the National Catholic Register.  

Burke then asked the conservative Latin-rite religious order, Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, to perform the Tridentine Mass at what was formerly St. Mary's.

http://www.riverfronttimes.com/2004-08-25/news/bishop-takes-queen/full/

The Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest is a religous community dedicated to exclusive use of the TLM.

. . .There was an attempt to get them to comply with the existing Canon Law requirements. They refused. Therefore it is no longer a Catholic church. Is it possible that this situation could have been handled differently? Probably.

What is the specific provision of Cankn Law to which you refer?

Quote from: poche

. . .There was an attempt to get them to comply with the existing Canon Law requirements. They refused. Therefore it is no longer a Catholic church. Is it possible that this situation could have been handled differently? Probably.

What is the specific provision of Cankn Law to which you refer?

Can. 1276 §1. It is for the ordinary to exercise careful vigilance over the administration of all the goods which belong to public juridic persons subject to him, without prejudice to legitimate titles which attribute more significant rights to him.

§2. With due regard for rights, legitimate customs, and circuмstances, ordinaries are to take care of the ordering of the entire matter of the administration of ecclesiastical goods by issuing special instructions within the limits of universal and particular law.

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__P4R.HTM

This could be another topic. But what would happen if Bishop Fellay were to sign an agreement with the Vatican and the individual boards of directors of the various chapels were to resist?

Quote

This could be another topic. But what would happen if Bishop Fellay were to sign an agreement with the Vatican and the individual boards of directors of the various chapels were to resist?

I didn't know that some chapels have a board of directors, ours does not.

Marsha

That was the issue for the church in St Louis. Who is in charge at the church. in most parishes where there is a parish council the council can only advise the pastor, they don't actually run the church, they don't actually run the church. It is the same thing with a diocesan council. There was a similar situation in California where the board of directors was unwilling to turn over their independant administration over to the diocese. Doing so would bring them into compliance with Canon Law but it would give control over to the bishop.