Does anyone else constantly think about that time a nun said “Katy Perry, please stop” before literally dropping dead in court? Just me? Because I think about it at least once a day, and it’s frankly a moment that we as a culture don’t spend enough time reflecting on and talking about, but now we’re going to take a moment and talk about it. Honestly, we owe it to ourselves.
In case you somehow missed out on all of this mess, here’s a timeline of what happened leading up to this event:
June 2015: Katy Perry sets her sights on the convent
Back in 2015, Katy Perry was in the market for a new home, and she laid out a cool $14.5 million for a sprawling former convent in the hills of Los Feliz, striking a deal with the local Catholic archdiocese. Problem was, the nuns who formerly inhabited the convent insisted that it belonged to them and was theirs to sell, so they went ahead and struck a separate deal with restauranteur Dana Hollister to buy it for $15.5 million. The stage was set for a bloody battle.
July 2015: Katy Perry tries to make nice with the nuns
Katy met with the nuns and attempted to butter them up by showing them her tattoo of Jesus and performing a rendition of Oh Happy Day, but it didn’t go well. After the meeting, Sister Rita Callinan was cutting about the pop star, saying she had to pull out her phone to find the words to the song. The nuns were unmoved, and insisted that they still wanted to sell to their original buyer, Hollister.
Callinan claimed this was because Hollister offered more. “[Katy’s] a very nice person, but it’s not the better deal. This is about money – control of money,” she said. She also objected to the fact that Katy wanted to turn the former convent into a private dwelling, whereas she and the other nuns felt it should be open to the public.
She was also fairly judgey in regards to Katy herself, saying: “Well, I found Katy Perry and I found her videos and … if it’s all right to say, I wasn’t happy with any of it.” Hmmm. It seemed Katy was going to get a Roar deal out of this.
July 2016:
Just when it seemed like the convent was The One That Got Away, Katy scored a victory. In July of 2015, a court ruled that the nuns’ swift sale of the convent was legally invalid, so Katy was back in the game. A year later, a lawyer for the local archdiocese confirmed that the sale to Hollister was not legal, and the convent was Katy’s to buy. Lawyers for the singer said they were pleaed with this development, however, the nuns weren’t going down withoug a fight, even as they saw their cause Circle The Drain.
March 2018: A nun literally dies in court after pleading with Katy to stop
Here’s where things really took a turn for the dramatic. Amidst ongoing legal challenges, Sister Catherine Rose Holzman, who was fighting the sale alongside Sister Callinan, spoke with local media, saying: “To Katy Perry, please stop. It’s not doing anyone any good except hurting a lot of people.” Hours later, she collapsed and died in court, during an appearance related to the case. A representative of the archdoicese said they were “sad to hear the news of her passing.”
Katycats reacted to news of the passing by sharing Swish Swish memes on Twitter, thanks to the unfortunately apt lyric “another one in the casket”.
June 2019: The last surviving nun says Katy has “blood on her hands”
At this point, the 81-year-old Sister Mary Callinan was the last surviving nun of the gorup, and she was still very angry at the singer. In an interview with the New York Post, she declared “I really didn’t like Katy Perry. I’m sure she doesn’t like me,” adding that she has “blood on her hands” as a result of the sale.
Wig.
October 2019: The sale appears to fizzle out
While there are scarce few details from this point on, it appears that Katy may not have purchased the convent after all. There were reports at the time that Katy Perry’s option to buy the property had expired, and there were rumours of it going back on the market for $25 million, but these were denied, and the archdoicese said it was still in communication with the singer.
We’re not sure exactly what’s going on right now, but it’s fair to say that Katy Perry’s wrangling to buy this property is Never …
Really …
Over.
