The First Woman Cardinal of the Catholic Church, IV   By Melissa Tawn   A solution for transsexuals is set up within the framework of the Catholic Church, and Cardinal O'Connor resigns her position.

INTRODUCTION: While each story in this series is independent of the others, it is highly recommended that one read the first three stories, in order to understand how Cardinal O’Connor transitioned and became the first woman cardinal of the Catholic Church.

------------------

As time passed, Mary-Anne Cardinal O’Connor became accepted more and more in Vatican circles and stopped being (as she sometimes called it) a “freak show” both to her colleagues and the media. She carefully stayed within the theological bounds: even though she had been ordained when she still was a young man, she eschewed all priestly functions. She granted no more interviews nor would she talk about gender issues in any forum. She managed to finish her major study of the theology of the great Dominican friar and saint Albertus Magnus of Cologne, a study widely praised both inside the church and in academia for its comprehensiveness and erudition. She returned to teaching. She never, however, regained the position of power and influence she had under the late Pope J**.

The routine of her life, however, was broken one day, when Cardinal O’Connor received a telephone request from the appointments secretary of Signora Angelica Montaperti, saying that her mistress would like an audience with Her Eminence Cardinal O’Connor at her Eminence’s earliest convenience. Though Cardinal O’Connor had never had the opportunity to meet Signora Montaperti in person, she knew, as did everyone in Rome, that Signora Montaperti was a very wealthy woman (whose wealth was rumored to exceed that of the Queen of England and the Queen of the Netherlands combined), who had the reputation of being a pious Catholic and who contributed tens of millions of euros to Catholic charities every year. Certainly she was someone to be taken seriously, and so a meeting was scheduled for 9:00 the next morning, in Cardinal O’Connor’s office at the Vatican.

At precisely 9:00 am, an elegant and immaculately-dressed oriental woman stepped through Cardinal O’Connor’s door. After being asked to sit, she came immediately to the point. “I would like to tell you a long story, your Eminence, and then ask a big favor of you. The details of this story are highly personal, and I would appreciate it if you treat them with utmost confidence.”

Cardinal O’Connor nodded in assent, and so she began.

“As you can see, I am not European by birth,” she began. “I am Thai, born in a small and very poor village in the north of the country. I was raised from birth as, to use the local term, a ladyboy. That is, I was born as a genetic male, but was raised and treated as a girl. My parents fed me natural female hormones in doses sufficient to keep my figure very girlish, though not enough to hamper my genital development. At the age of 11, I was sold to a brothel in Phuket, where I was trained for a year in the feminine arts and the arts of pleasing those men who come to Thailand looking for “exotic” sexual thrills. I was then sold to a larger brothel in Bangkok, where my training both as a woman and as a whore were further refined. At the age of 13, I was sent to a clinic for breast implantation and some other cosmetic surgery. I was then resold, along with fifteen other girls, to a Singapore-based group of people smugglers who transported us by various means to Albania.

From the Albanian coast, in the dead of night, we were smuggled by fast boat across the Adriatic Sea into Italy, where I was once again sold to a brothel in Rome which specialized in “clients with special tastes”. That house, by the way, is less than two kilometers from the Vatican and numbers among its patrons several high-ranking members of the Curia, and more than one of your colleagues in the College of Cardinals. I was fortunate in that, because of the select nature of the clientele, we were given decent food and clothing, as well as regular medical checkups. Nonetheless, I hated my life there.

Most of the clients treated us like dogs or, at best, like serving women. The one exception, and the only one of my regular clients I looked forward to, was a man in his middle fifties named Umberto, who came twice a week. He always treated me with kindness and consideration, and often brought me presents. I, in turn, always tried to do the best to please him. One day, however, I could stand it no longer and, after a particularly gratifying session, I started crying and told him that this would probably be our last time together, because I intended to escape from the house later that night and drown myself in the Tiber. He cradled me in his arms like a little girl, and gently calmed me down. He then told me to get dressed, and had me lead him to the manager of the brothel, a brutal man whom we all called Three-Eye Luigi because of his affectation of wearing a monocle in one eye.

Without knocking, Umberto barged into Luigi’s office walked up to his desk, and stated: “I want to buy Angelica from you and take her from here. Tell me your price.”

“We don’t sell the girls who work here, we only rent them,” replied Luigi, “so kindly leave.”

Umberto shot out his hand, grabbed Luigi’s monocle, and smashed it on the desk. “You do not know to whom you are talking,” he said in a slow and even tone of voice. “I am Umberto Montaperti, and what I want, I get. I own this building and, for that matter, all of the buildings on this street. Unless you sell Angelica to me immediately, within one hour you and all of your girls will be out on the sidewalk watching while my bulldozers raze your establishment to the ground.

Even I knew enough about the name Umberto Montaperti to be awed. He was considered one of the richest, and most ruthless, men in Italy if not all of Europe, having parlayed the family-owned chain of retail outlets into a marketing empire, to which he added a media conglomerate which included three television networks and dozens of major newspapers and magazines, the second-largest automobile manufacturer in the country, a major construction company, a premier-league football team, huge tracts of real estate, and hundreds of other enterprises in Italy and abroad. He was rumored to “own” several government ministers, a majority in both houses of the Italian parliament (which routinely passed tax legislation with loopholes tailor-made for his creative bookkeepers), hundreds of high-ranking police officials, and judges by the score. No politician would dare say anything against him. Even the Mafia never challenged him directly, preferring an unwritten division of spoils to confrontation. This was not a person you casually dismissed from your office.

Luigi picked up his phone, dialed a number, and began talking excitedly in a Sicilian dialect which I couldn’t follow. After a minute, he put it down, and turned to Umberto in a most obsequious manner: “Signore Montaperti, I most humbly apologize for the misunderstanding. It is true that under no circumstances do we sell our girls, but we are always happy to make presents to our sincere friends. Please take her as a gift of the house. Please take as many of the girls as you wish.”

Umberto did not even thank him. “Get your personal effects,” he said to me. “Never mind your other clothes, I will get you new and better ones anyway.”

Within five minutes, I was seated in Umberto’s huge Mercedes limousine, while his chauffeur navigated through the streets of Rome. We arrived at the largest mansion I have ever been in, and he led me gently to a bedroom which would most certainly have awed Marie Antoinette. “Now sleep, my darling Angelica, and never think of suicide again. Tomorrow is a new dawn in your life.”

Early the next morning, Umberto phoned the editor-in-chief of the leading fashion magazine in Italy (which he owned), told her to cancel all of her appointments for the next three days, and report to his house within the hour. He then gave her a no-limit credit card and ordered her to outfit me completely, from the skin out, at the best fashion houses in Rome. I was also taken for a private session at the best and most exclusive beauty spa in Rome (which he also owned), which had been cleared of all of its other clients, and given the complete works. Of course, some of the people who fitted me and treated me saw or felt what I had between my legs, but nobody said a word. Signore Montaperti’s tastes were known in certain (very select and very discreet) circles, and were not to be commented on.

By the second day — and this is surely a record for the Italian bureaucracy — I also held in my hands papers, signed by the Minister himself, attesting that Miss Angelica Tirasupa, a female born in Thailand, was a legally naturalized citizen of Italy. I am sure that had I wanted a valid driver’s license, I could have had that too, but there was no need for one since, before the week was out, I had my own pink Lancia limousine and personal driver.

It goes without saying that I did my utmost to repay Umberto, both in bed and out of it, with all of the love, care, and attention I could. The more I knew him, the more I loved him, for I found out that underneath the businessman’s gruff exterior was a gentle and affectionate man, who needed a woman to whom he could talk and who would support him in all he did. He had been married once, when he was a young man, but his wife was killed a year after their nuptials, when her Ferrari sports car hit a bridge abutment which she did not sense through her alcoholic haze. He never remarried.

I was also surprised to find that, contrary to the image he deliberately cultivated, Umberto was quite learned. He was capable of quoting at length from Shakespeare and Byron in English, Racine and Voltaire in French, Goethe and Lessing in German, Seneca and Terrence in Latin, and Dante and Petrarch in Italian. His knowledge of European history was astounding. The 10,000 or so books in the library of his mansion were not just there for show — he had read most of them and consulted all of the others. He was a man of contrasts, capable one minute of planning the technical details of an expedition to look for uranium ore in the Altai Mountains (without consulting notes — he kept all details of his business dealings in his head) and then, the next moment, sitting with me on the patio looking at the setting sun and holding my hand like an embarrassed teenager.

During the next three months, I was treated like a model-in-training. I had my own full-time hairdresser and cosmetician, my own fashion expert, and my own language tutor who helped me replace the rough Italian I had learned in the brothel with the refined literary language of the Roman upper classes. Then, when he felt I was ready, Umberto began taking me out into society. As Umberto Montaperti’s partner, I was, of course, immediately given pride of place at the top of the social pecking order.

Only once did I feel confounded. I was in the powder room at a very expensive and private club, fixing my makeup, when the Swedish “blonde bombshell” actress Ingrid Eriksson — who was in Rome to star in another Fellini film — walked in and introduced herself. ‘I just wanted to tell you that we both share the same secret,’ she said, ‘I also am capable of peeing standing up.’ I stood there horrified; how had she found out? She seemed to read my mind. ‘You didn’t give yourself away, Angelica, you are perfect. But I am one of those few who have a personal knowledge of Umberto’s tastes. Don’t worry,’ she said, hugging me, ‘in my opinion, we two are the luckiest women alive. I hope that you and I will become the best of friends.’”

At this point, Cardinal O’Connor briefly interrupted the story. “I remember Ingrid Eriksson, but she seems to have disappeared completely. Whatever happened to her?”

“After her film career began to wane, she decided to return to her male self,” said Angelica. “He had those magnificent breasts removed surgically and went back to using his birth name of Ingmar. He now runs a small art gallery in Lund, is happily married to a woman who knows about his past, and has two beautiful daughters who don’t. We are still the best of friends and keep in constant touch. Every summer the Eriksson family spends two weeks with me, cruising the Mediterranean on my yacht.”

“To return to my story,” she continued. “I was in heaven for a period of two years, a princess of Roman society, on the arm of a rich and powerful man, whom I loved with all my heart, and who in turn loved me no less. Then, as in all real-life stories, tragedy followed happiness, and Umberto suffered his first major stroke. He had the best medical attention available, needless to say, but the situation was touch-and-go for a long while. In the end, he was left with his mind intact but the lower half of his body totally paralyzed. He was also no longer capable of any sexual activity whatsoever. During the next six months, I nursed him around the clock. I pampered him, fed him, read to him, and made him feel as loved and wanted as I possibly could.

Umberto had always been interested in religion and it was during this period that we began to seriously read the Bible together and then the works of the Church Fathers and other theological works -- including some of your books, I may add. We prayed together and strengthened our feelings of love for God and our Savior. It was then that we also began making large contributions to Catholic charities, a task which Umberto asked me to undertake without involving him directly, since he was afraid that the charities may not want to accept money ‘tainted’ by his questionable business practices directly from his hands.

One day, Umberto called me to his side, and told me, very seriously, that he had two questions to ask me. The first was whether I had ever desired to remove the maleness from between my legs. I answered, truthfully, that I had always dreamt of it, but that I would never even consider actually doing it, since I knew he preferred me as I am. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘since I am no longer capable of enjoying your favors, now is the time to fulfill your wish.’ Then, almost as an afterthought, he added ‘The second question will wait until this is taken care of.’

With his customary efficiency, he immediately arranged for me to fly to a private clinic near Geneva where, within a week, I was operated on by doctors flown in from Bangkok for the purpose. After I returned, and proudly showed him the results of the operation, he hugged me and said ‘And now for the second question I needed to ask you.’ With that, he pulled out of his pocket a small box, and opened it to reveal the most beautiful diamond-encrusted ring I have ever seen. ‘Angelica, my darling, my love,’ he said, ‘you have already made me happier than I had ever thought possible. Will you be my wife?’

A week later, we were married in a small private ceremony, personally conducted by your colleague Cardinal della Rovere, who is distantly related to Umberto and a close personal friend.”

For the ensuing 15 months, I was constantly at Umberto’s side, easing his pain as best I could and, at the same time, helping him to make his peace with himself and with God as best he could. When his second, and fatal, stroke came, I felt that he had done that, and that he went to the next world in peace and faith as a true Christian. That, then, is my story.”

“It is a very touching story,” replied Cardinal O’Connor, who was most genuinely moved. “But why are you telling me all of this?”

“After Umberto’s death,” replied Angelica, “I realized what a great part of my life our love had been, and felt rudderless without him. While I inherited his entire estate, I did not have the business sense nor did I possess the fierce desire to succeed that he had. I therefore arranged to sell off most of his enterprises, putting the money in sound and prudent long-term investments, which needed little day-to-day tending. The whirl of society, without Umberto at my side, bored me and I began refusing many more invitations than I accepted. I spent more and more of my time in spiritual reading and contemplation of this world, and of the next.

In the societies of the Orient there is a custom that the widow of a powerful man retires to a convent for the rest of her days, and I began to see the wisdom of that tradition, and resolved to do likewise. However, I was shamed and shocked to find out that most orders of nuns would not have me as soon as they learned that I was not a genetic female — a detail I refused to hide or lie about. I have therefore resolved to set up my own order of nuns, one into which women like me and you will be welcomed (though, of course, this will nowhere be written down explicitly). It will not be a cloistered order, but one which will run hospices or shelters for girls disowned by their parents (and especially girls like us); a place where they can find understanding and love, as well as a chance to contemplate and plan their future. If they decide to continue on their path, we will help them and welcome them into our ranks, should they so desire. If they decide to revert back to their male life, as did Ingmar Eriksson, we will help them do that too, and continue to love and support them.”

“It is a noble plan,” replied Cardinal O’Connor, “but I am not sure I can help you fulfill it. I have very little power in Vatican circles these days.”

“Oh, I do not need your help for that,” replied Angelica. “There are still many members of the Curia and the College of Cardinals who owed favors to Umberto, and I have not cancelled those debts. And there are others about whom, let me say, I know things that they would rather not become public. They will help me too, I am sure. More than that, I intend to endow the proposed order with all of the funds at my disposal, and three billion euros can speak most eloquently.

I do, however, need your help in something else, and that is in finding candidates for this order. I imagine that since your own transformation, many sincere Catholic transsexual women have contacted you to help them find their place in the church. Among them, there are, I am sure, 20 or 30 who would be perfect for this planned order. Would you help me locate them and make contact with them, and turn this dream into reality?”

--------------------

It took over five years of pressure, persuasion, and (in a few cases) outright blackmail, but in the end Angelica Montaperti’s dream was realized, and the Order of the Poor Sisters of St. Fanchea did become a reality. The order’s first hospice was opened later that year, in that building not far from the Vatican, where Angelica was first employed as a whore when she came to Rome many years before. Others were planned for Los Angeles, Bangkok, and Montreal. The last of these was also going to include a companion hospice for female-to-male transsexuals, which was appropriately named Pelletier House.

Later that year, Cardinal Mary-Anne O’Connor, the first woman cardinal of the Catholic Church, wrote a letter to the His Holiness, petitioning to be allowed to resign from the College of Cardinals, and continue her service to the Church as a simple nun. Her request was granted.