Betrayal at the Altar: Trans Marriages and Queer Traditions in a Crumbling Church

How Argentine priests and Malta prelates endorse LGBT “sacraments” while Traditional Poor Clares are cast out

A Transgender “Wedding” in Corrientes

In late January 2026 a shockwave rippled through Argentina’s Catholic community. At the Our Lady of Pompeii parish in Corrientes, a local priest (after consulting Archbishop José Adolfo Larregain) publicly blessed a couple who both identify as transgender. Solange Ayala, a biologically male LGBT activist “presenting as a woman,” and his partner Isaías (a biologically female homosexual presenting as a man) completed a standard Catholic marriage preparation, the priest asserts. The ceremony was celebrated using the names by which they are publicly known, and photographs and videos went viral across media.

This was no private blessing. It was treated as a valid sacrament of marriage. The archbishop’s judgment was blunt: biologically, one is male, the other female, so “there was no canonical impediment” to the marriage. In other words, the bishop certified that because the couple are opposite in body, the Church’s formal requirements were met, even though both publicly present as the opposite sex. Unsurprisingly, Catholics worldwide felt scandalized. The local archdiocese immediately launched a canonical investigation, noting that “essential conditions for the proper celebration” were omitted and had “distorted its profound meaning,” causing confusion among the faithful. In its official statement the archdiocese reiterated that true Christian marriage requires a “true consent… as the Church understands and teaches” it; namely, a covenant of one man and one woman open to life.

The Corrientes incident reveals a crisis in the post-Vatican II Church: pastors are sanctioning “marriages” that defy nature, then scrambling to explain it away. The Catechism and Canon Law plainly teach marriage as a covenant between a man and a woman, ordered to procreation. Yet here the outward signs of the sacrament (pronouncing vows, giving Communion) were witnessed to an audience under false pretenses, since both spouses were known public activists promoting gender ideology.

The archdiocese’s own statement admitted that no marriage documentation was ever filed and that the ceremony has no canonical record; basically confirming it was irregular. But the damage was done: the video is out there. True marriage was emptied of its meaning, replaced with the spirit of the world. These events beg the question: why are bishops more eager to bless a headline-generating stunt than to catechize the faithful about objective truth and sin? As one Catholic commentator warns, this “fault line between doctrinal clarity and pastoral practice” opens the door to confusion, whether or not canon law was technically violated.

Archbishop Scicluna’s Gospel of Acceptance

Meanwhile in Europe, Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta (often associated with progressive currents) was spreading a different message. On Feb. 3, 2026 he published a meditation on Outreach (Fr. James Martin’s LGBT-affirming apostolate) proclaiming that “God’s loving presence embraces all of us, including LGBTQ people.” Scicluna’s language is pastoral counseling: there are no identities or experiences “beyond God’s loving gaze”, and even our “wounds, questions and hopes” become “places of encounter” with the divine. He urges Christians to show “respect and tenderness irrespective of…sexual differences,” asserting that this is “what God’s inclusive love is all about.”

At first glance it sounds compassionate, but it is deeply problematic. In Scicluna’s view the Church is no longer a place of judgment, but a safe space where no moral law intrudes on personal identity. He never once mentions sin or the need for repentance. There is no call to conform one’s life to God’s commandments, only to reassure that feelings and identity themselves are acceptable. This echoes a broader liberal trend: not only must the Church “love” sinners, it must never even hint that the sinner’s actions are disordered. This was the very criticism leveled by LifeSiteNews after Scicluna’s essay: he “failed to mention the Church’s rejection of homosexuality and transgenderism,” though Persona Humana explicitly calls homosexual acts “intrinsically disordered”.

In contrast, the Gospel of Christ urges sinners to repent (cf. Luke 13:3) and warns us countless times of judgment and hellfire. The Catechism itself, which Scicluna did not cite, states plainly: homosexual persons must be “accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity” but homosexual acts are gravely sinful. Those attracted to the same sex are “called to chastity.” But Scicluna omits all this. Instead he offers therapy-style reassurance: God “dwells within every human life”, we should trust, not fear, and see our struggles as opportunities for grace. It is a gospel of the self, not the cross. The archbishop even invokes Brother Lawrence’s idea that even washing dishes can be prayer, sidestepping moral discipline entirely. The scandal is that the shepherd of Malta has published these ideas under the banner of “Catholic” teaching. His assurance that “we can live safe in the knowledge that we are all lovingly held by God at every moment” may comfort sinners, but it echoes what one commentator called a “bag of heresy” by omitting the penance Christ demands.

In short, the message now often heard from our pulpits is: fear not, there is no sin, only feelings and inclusion. As one forewarning catechism verse notes, this is a dangerous path, for the Church is called to heal wounds, yes, but never to sacrifice truth on the altar of tolerance. Scicluna’s phrase that we should “welcome… all with…respect and tenderness… irrespective of…sexual differences” neatly sums up the age: inclusion at all costs. Yet the faith that Jesus preached was not ambiguous. He once promised to “burn the chaff with unquenchable fire” (Matt. 3:12). Where is that fire today? And what will happen to souls told that their woundedness is just fine with God?

Queer Candlemas: Neapolitan Femminielli in Church

In Mercogliano, Italy, this year’s Candlemas (Feb. 2) Mass was anything but ordinary. According to Religion News Service, the pews of the Church of the Annunziata were “filled with guests wearing lacquered nails, towering wigs and heavy eyelashes.” This flamboyant congregation comprised hundreds of femminielli, a traditional Neapolitan third-gender identity (male-born individuals who live and express themselves in female roles). The annual La Juta pilgrimage, an old Candlemas custom honoring the Madonna of Montevergine, became a full-blown celebration of queer folklore. Transgender women were invited for the first time to do readings during Mass, and outside the church a self-described “Gold Queen” entertainer proudly declared that some clergy “tear down the walls of inequality” in Christ’s name. The homily even framed the festival as “the encounter between the human and the divine,” as if to bless the mixture of pagan celebration with Catholic ritual.

What did this Mass look like? The RNS account describes it: after Communion, the bilingual crowd transitioned into a “bawdy, performative version of traditional Neapolitan bingo,” complete with karaoke, pop music mash-ups with Marian prayers, and “irreverent jokes.” In short, a drag show full of neon and humor, all under the sign of Our Lady. The pilgrims even recalled a medieval legend of Madonna saving two lovers tied to ice, an obvious symbol reinterpreted as solidarity with same-sex couples. Meanwhile, the prayer of the faithful was led by a trans woman (“Lust Queen”), who spoke of their gathering as an “act of faith [and] an act of resistance” on behalf of “all oppressed peoples.” In a city once proud of its staged weddings and fertility rites, every caricature of traditional gender is now openly sanctified. Songs invoking the Virgin Mary blended seamlessly with the latest pop hits, a fusion of Catholic, local folklore, and queer pop culture.

This spectacle is shocking on many levels. Catholic liturgy, especially at Candlemas, is meant to recall Mary’s purity and Christ’s presentation at the Temple. Instead, the church was turned into a New-Age carnival. Call it heresy or cultural expression; either way it is far outside what the faith intends. No Gospel preacher of old would have invited a drag parade into the sanctuary; indeed, Saint Paul warned the Corinthians that those who disrupt the sacred order of the Eucharist bring judgment on themselves (1 Cor. 11:27-30). Instead, the bishop of Avellino apparently gave tacit permission to celebrate the “identity” of “femminielli” as divine. And so ancient Naples folklore, with echoes of fertility cults, pagan hymns and sirens, was revived in the aisles. Anthropologists even note the parallels with pre-Christian fertility rites, yet here it was given the blessing of a Christian symbol.

To many Catholics of any stripe, mixing secular drag with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is scandalous. That a mob in heavy eyeliner can call the altar “our home” shows how far the Church’s front doors have opened. Yet as one pilgrim said, this event “felt like the Lord’s house… our home too.” The irony is bitter: the nominal Church opens its arms to this “queer cultural heritage,” calling it a pure corner of creation, while chastising those who cling to traditional faith. It seems the modern clergy have taken to heart Scicluna’s words that all questions and identities are “places of encounter,” whether they accord with truth or not. But the liturgical rubrics give no instruction for drag queens at the ambo or for karaoke mixing with the Angelus. One wonders how many young Catholics, watching this spectacle, felt that Christ’s Church had become as unrecognizable as the idols they secretly defy.

Exiled Sisters: The Poor Clares of Belorado

Meanwhile, elsewhere in Europe the faithful are quietly suffering. In Belorado, a small town in northern Spain, sixteen Poor Clare nuns made a fateful decision in May 2024: they repudiated the post-Vatican II “Reform” and declared allegiance instead to a sedevacantist bishop. Sister Isabel de la Trinidad and her sisters publicly aligned themselves with Bishop Pablo de Rojas Sánchez-Franco (who claims a succession from Archbishop Thục). For this they were swiftly excommunicated by Cardinal Iceta’s Burgos curia and ordered to leave their monastery. The world barely noticed as these contemplative women, known locally for their cloistered life and artisanal chocolates, became fugitives of conscience.

Now the ex-Poor Clares are living without a permanent home, fundraising online on their site queremosunconvento.com (“we want a convent”). They describe themselves as “threatened with eviction…singled out, mistreated… and persecuted” simply for holding to “their own way of life,” meaning traditional Catholicism. They admit no desire for special privileges, only a roof under which to continue the same austere life of prayer and penance they have always known. Instead, secular courts (at the behest of the hierarchy) have ordered them evicted from St. Clare’s convent in Belorado. These sisters cannot even depend on the loyalty of sedevacantist prelates: the same bishops they tried to follow (Rojas and later Rodrigo da Silva, who echoed the Thục line) each left the scene one by one, while the nuns were left vulnerable.

Contrast this with the indulgence shown to the events above. The archdiocese is ferocious with these nuns. The only canon they see is “leave consecrated life” or suffer latae sententiae penalty. Yet priests who bless transgender marriages face only a warning, and bishops who reinvent doctrine are feted in international media. How perverse the logic: women cloistered in poverty and prayer, accused only of loving Christ with the old liturgy, are declared “heretics” and driven to the edges of society. One can only imagine the Gospel the nuns continue to preach quietly. It must be the very Word that the conciliar Church has forgotten.

The sisters even took to making fine chocolates to support themselves, selling confections under the brand “Erre que Erre” and running a cloistered restaurant by volunteers. These mundane trades underscore their humility; they do not proselytize or agitate, they simply live what they believe. Their only crime has been refusing to accept the Vatican’s sexual revolution and liturgical revolution. In response, the only future they see is the abandonment of many unused convents in Spain; an irony, since thousands of genuine religious vocations have disappeared while the empty houses of Christ sit available. Even a bishop of a small breakaway Polish church offered them shelter (in a tacit acknowledgement that Rome cannot be trusted).

The Poor Clares of Belorado stand in stark opposition to the trends of the other stories. They are not celebrated by diocesan press or invited to conferences. They are not canvassing the world for “wounded souls,” only for a corner of silence to worship. In a world where the established Church tells the LGBTQ+ movement, “come as you are and you are loved,” it tells these nuns, “you must go,” as if their very piety were the contagion. And yet it is the heroes of the faith, not the rebels, who have been punished.

Conclusion: Two Churches Emerge

These four headlines: an Argentine “trans” wedding, a Maltese archbishop’s love-talk, a Neapolitan queer pilgrimage, and Spanish nuns exiled, are chapters in a single drama. They illustrate two diverging paths within “Catholicism” today. On one road, bishops and priests increasingly fuse the Church with the spirit of this age: redefining marriage on personal whims, softening the moral law into airy notions of “inclusion”, and blending liturgy with drag pageantry. On the other road walk the few who still cling to immutable truth, and who are met with scorn and expulsion.

For traditional Catholics, this is more than a culture-war skirmish; it is a crucible. The sacraments themselves are at stake. If the Conciliar Church can bless what the Gospel forbids, what becomes of the faithful’s trust? Yet those who resist the tide must also ask themselves: where can they turn? The sedevacantist nuns of Spain have admitted that in this “depopulated” Catholic landscape, perhaps only in abandonment by man can we be safe under God.

It is not too strong to say the Crisis of the Church is upon us: not simply scandal, but the very loss of sacred meaning. When a bishop willfully undermines sacraments and an archbishop preaches a gospel without repentance, the question arises: is this still Catholicism, or something new? History warns us that no divine blessing rests on a Church that rejects its doctrines. As the Gospel itself says, “A house divided cannot stand.”

And yet, the God of Catholic Tradition remains at work outside the glitz of liberal religiosity. In monasteries where the veil is kept, in those who remain in quiet resistance, His grace is not absent. These stories should sober all who love the true Faith: either the conciliar Church reforms before it is too late, or the remnants of orthodoxy will have to preserve the truth in exile, as the Poor Clares attempt in Spain. If so, let it be known that in 2026 the sheep of Christ’s flock have every reason to fear a shepherd gone missing and to seek him wherever He may hide.

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