{"id":349616,"date":"2026-09-17T21:26:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T21:26:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/349616\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T21:26:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T21:26:09","slug":"benedictine-sisters-join-fight-against-new-york-state-gender-identity-care-mandate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/349616\/","title":{"rendered":"Benedictine Sisters Join Fight Against New York State Gender-Identity Care Mandate"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"\"\"\"A photo shows Dominican postulant Anna Harper, a native of Baton Rouge, La., and Dominican Sister Carmela Marie, a native of Hinatuan, Philippines, visiting with patient Edna MacCready at Rosary Hill Home in Hawthorne, N.Y. Rosary Hill was founded by Rose Hawthorne, later known as Mother Mary Alphonsa. She also founded the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, and on March 14, 2024, Pope Francis advanced her sainthood cause by declaring her venerable. (Photo: OSV\/Gregory Shemitz)<\/p>\n

by Tablet Staff\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict\u00a0have\u00a0joined the\u00a0lawsuit the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne\u00a0filed\u00a0against the state in April,\u00a0challenging\u00a0its\u00a0gender identity mandates.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At the heart of the issue is New York\u2019s LGBTQ Long-Term Care Facility Residents\u2019 Bill of Rights, which, effective May 2024, prohibits long-term care facilities and their staff from discriminating against any resident\u00a0based on\u00a0gender identity. The mandate only exempts facilities\u00a0operated\u00a0by the Church of Christ, Scientist.<\/p>\n

The Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict\u00a0operate\u00a0St. Joseph\u2019s Home for the Aged, a 60-bed assisted living facility in Huntington, New York.\u00a0They have served elderly, infirm residents for over 50 years, and they accept no government funding.<\/p>\n

\u201cI fully support the sisters\u2019 decision to seek relief from New York\u2019s gender ideology mandate being imposed on nursing homes and adult care facilities,\u201d said Bishop John Barres of Rockville Centre, where the Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict conduct their ministry. \u201cSometimes Catholics need to take a stand for their Catholic values, and the Benedictine Sisters are doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, meanwhile,\u00a0operate\u00a0Rosary Hill Home, which is a 42-bed skilled nursing facility that provides palliative care and comfort to terminal cancer patients. They sued the state in April, and\u00a0the Department of Justice\u00a0has since joined.<\/p>\n

The mandate, the lawsuit states, \u201cprohibits Rosary Hill Home and its staff from assigning patients to rooms by biological sex, prohibits segregating restrooms by biological sex, requires the use of patients\u2019 preferred pronouns even when the patient is not present, and requires allowing patients to cross-dress.\u201d<\/p>\n

RELATED: Dominican Sisters Challenge New York State Gender-Identity Law<\/a><\/p>\n

The sisters and the facility face\u00a0fines, injunctions, potential loss of licensing, and imprisonment if they\u00a0fail to\u00a0comply, according to the lawsuit.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With the lawsuit, which was filed in\u00a0the\u00a0United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, and now\u00a0the Missionary Sisters of St. Benedict, are asking the court to declare that the mandate violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, prevent the state from enforcing the mandate against them, and award them \u201cthe costs of this action and reasonable attorney\u2019s fees as provided by law,\u201d as well as \u201csuch other and further relief as the Court deems equitable and just.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement to The Tablet back when the lawsuit was filed, a spokesperson for the New York State Department of Health stood by the mandate.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile the Department does not comment on pending or ongoing litigation,\u201d they said, \u201cthe NYS\u00a0Department of Health is committed to following state law, which provides nursing home residents certain rights protecting against discrimination including, but not limited to, gender identity or expression.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gov. Kathy Hochul,\u00a0when\u00a0it was passed, hailed the mandate as allowing New York\u2019s seniors to\u00a0live\u00a0with \u201cthe dignity and respect they deserve, free from discrimination.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLGBTQIA+ and HIV-positive seniors are among our most vulnerable populations,\u201d\u00a0she said in a statement,\u00a0\u201cand today we are taking steps to ensure that all New Yorkers \u2014 regardless of who they are, who they love, or their HIV status \u2014 find safety and support in places where they need it the most. Hate will never have a place in New York.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andrew Nussbaum, the\u00a0attorney representing the\u00a0Missionary\u00a0Sisters\u00a0of St. Benedict, said the state\u2019s mandate \u201cis particularly egregious because the state exempts care facilities operated by the Christian Science Church but\u00a0not\u00a0other religions, and because it permits secular clinical judgment but not religious clinical judgment.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A photo shows Dominican postulant Anna Harper, a native of Baton Rouge, La., and Dominican Sister Carmela Marie,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349617,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[9,11,10,49,51,50],"class_list":["post-349616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}