Katy Perry has found herself in the middle of a legal brawl involving a $15 million-plus property that she is trying to wrest from Catholic nuns who fought her tooth and nail and refused to sell. But money buys everything even the church. The legal battle that started in 2015 has revealed dirty secrets about how the Catholic hierarchy favors the rich where Perry says the 25 bedroom property in Los Feliz Neighborhood in Los Angeles was sold to her by the Archbishop Jose Gomez who says he is in control of the content which is under the archdiocese.
The nuns sister Rita Callanan 80 and Sister Catherine Rose Holzman both belong to the sisters of immaculate heart of Mary. Sister Callanan now lives in poverty in a small convent belonging to St Bernadette’s church. She lives in poverty with no recourse to funds for medical care and without any support from the archbishop, speaking to reporters Sr Rita wonders and recalls how such a thing happened.
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Sister Callahan 80 suffering from breast cancer has no food but cereal to eat every day. She has no bank balance and no funds for her own medical care, her last healthcare cheque bounced twice and she has no clue as to who is going to lend her money to seek medical help for her cancer treatment. It doesn’t look like the church is doing much either. It was just few years ago that she had about a hundred thousand in the bank and was a millionaire on paper, but she has no clue where it all went. (It was closed by the Archbishop).
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The sisters of the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary lived In the huge pink mansion convent with 25 bedrooms and 25 bathrooms, but that was their only luxury until Katy Perry 32 came along waving her millions at the Archbishop. She was about to take away the only thing in their name and all because Perry had the backing of the Archbishop of Los Angeles Jose Gomez whom she says she paid around $16 million in 2015 after brokering a deal with him for the property that is worth much more than that. Archbishop Gomez claims that the convent is under the ownership of the Archdiocese but the nuns claim otherwise.
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The nuns Sister Callanan 80 and Sister Catherine Rose Holzman 89 objected to the deal saying that the convent belonged to the order and has been in their possession for the last 45 years and the Archbishop had no right to sell it without their permission. In fact, they had also found a buyer for the property who turned out to be Dana Hollister who wanted to convert it into a boutique.
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On Friday last week the 9th of March, the court ruled in favor of the Archbishop ordering Hollister to pay Perry and the Archbishop $15 million for interfering in the deal and that the nuns had no right to the property which it ruled belonged to the Archdiocese.
It was then that tragedy struck when Sister Catherine Rose Holzman exhausted from the proceedings, collapsed in court and died right there in the Los Angeles courtroom. Sister Catherine’s photo is shown below.
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Sister Callanan has promised she will never give up fighting and has revealed how harassment from the Archbishop has slowly but surely dwindled their order. This is what she said 'On March 9th, 2018 we tragically lost Sister Catherine Rose, my beloved fellow IHM Sister and original organizer of this GoFundMe campaign. She was my cherished partner in this ongoing legal battle to keep our convent. It is now more important than ever to continue this fight and for our cause to prevail.'
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Sister Callanan suffers from diabetes and breast cancer and recalls how multi-millionaire singer Perry told them she wanted the 22,000 feet property so that she could just sip tea and be herself. But that’s hardly the focal point of the story. It gets much worse and shocking.
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Sister Callanan revealed something shocking about the harassment meted out to the nuns by the Archbishop. She says "All these years of my religious life, I would never have expected to be fighting an archbishop to keep our own property and money, so we can care for ourselves. We don't want the archbishop handling our money."
Callanan also revealed how the Archbishop has been slowly making sure every sister is sent to a separate retirement home so that they would not be united. If you are still wondering what happened to the thousands of dollars in sister Callanan’s bank account? Well!! She says it was suddenly closed. Each sister had almost $299,772 in their bank accounts which she revealed when this story was first carried by the daily mail. Now Callanan lives a frugal lifestyle with nothing to survive on as the Archbishop refuses to pay any of her legal bills. She only survives on a paltry stipend provided by the RCA. (Royal Catholic Archdiocese).
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The convent in question was built in 1927 and belonged to Entrepreneur Earle Anthony and subsequently Sir Daniel Donohue and his wife Countess Bernadine Murphy Donohue. The couple sold the property for a paltry sum that was almost a gift to the nuns who raised approximate $600,938 in 3 years and paid off the amount. Below is a photo of Sister Rita on the left and Sister Catherine Rose on the right.
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Sister Callanan said 'All we are asking is to sell our own property, keep our own money so we can take care of ourselves until the last person dies, then the money and property can go to the archbishop. There are not many more years, give me a break. He's supposed to be a chief shepherd.”
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The Archbishop claimed that Rome gave him permission to take over the convent in 2005 but when Sister Callanan researched along with research from Rome, she found that Rome had given no such permission. It was a friend of the Archbishop who issued him a letter of authority.
This is when the Archbishop started sending the sisters to retirement homes after sealing their bank accounts.
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Sister Callanan now stays in a small convent which is part of St Bernadette Catholic Church in Los Angeles. Although she says that the Archdiocese pays her rent and household bills, they have reduced her stipend to just $750 per month. Her health bills are never paid on time where Sister Catherine Holzman who died in the courthouse also had unpaid medical bills of $700.
'He is claiming he's taking care of us, that's not true. We send bills up there and they don't get paid. I was yelling and reporting it to Rome; they have now sent a check so I have money for groceries. Everything they don't pay for us, it goes right to the Pope. The Vatican is well aware of what this man is doing.”
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As for the Archbishop, he denies all such allegations saying that the sisters are taken duly care of. Sister Callanan says there are other sisters with money who can help but will not for fear of the same thing happening to them and their money taken away.
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