MASS DRAG
How the Catholic Church Came to Bless Gay Love… Again
Five drag nuns. One gay bar.
A thousand years of queer history
the Church would rather you not know about.
No spam. No selling of souls. Unsubscribe any time.
Watch for a note from Sebastian at sebastian@massdrag.org to confirm — check Spam, Promotions, or Other if it doesn’t turn up. The Sisters have been known to get lost in the mail.
And thank you, Rochester — every performance at the Biltmore sold out.
Sisters of the Blessed Canon
Teaser Video
From the March 2026 table read — 20+ participants, standing ovation.
The Show
It’s October 9, the anniversary of the canonization of Saint John Henry Newman — a Victorian cardinal who loved another man for thirty-two years, asked to share his grave for eternity, and was made a saint anyway.
Five Sisters of the Blessed Canon are performing a High Drag Mass in a gay bar. They follow the full structure of the Catholic liturgy — processional, readings, homily, offering, communion, recessional. But the sacred texts are Newman’s love letters, Vatican dossiers, and a saint who turned up missing from his grave.
Why do we keep asking for the blessing
of an institution that has
tried to bury us?
Centuries Documented same-sex union ceremonies in the Catholic Church
Centuries Men tried by Church inquisitions for sodomy, then burned at the stake
James Lopata
Book, music, and lyrics
- Master of Theological Studies, Harvard Divinity School
- Harvard Institute of Coaching Fellow
- Studied playwriting under Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott
- Cantor for several decades in Catholic parishes, including the landmark 1998 Rochester LGBTQ Catholic Mass under Bishop Matthew Clark
- Grammy Voting Member
- Founder, Massachusetts LGBT Chamber of Commerce
He knows the history in this play from the inside. The Catholic liturgy, the queer grief, the spiritual hunger, the dark comedy of an institution that keeps blessing and erasing the same love. Mass Drag is the show he was always going to write.
Come to Mass.
You know it’s been too long. Sebastian · Personal AssistantSisters of the Blessed Canon