# A Nun in Court **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 10, 2012, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373 "2012-04-10T15:44:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/1 "2012-04-10T15:44:44Z")
[Philly.com](http://Philly.com) is reporting a nun was called to testify in court in the sex abuse trial. She said a certain priest had pornographic magazines delivered to a church office she ran for the priest. She said she was moved from her position when she mentioned the problem. Her name is Joan Scary. That is to say her name is **Sister Scary.** That is all. ---
**Author:** ![scareyfaerie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scareyfaerie/32/3135_2.png) [@scareyfaerie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scareyfaerie)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/2 "2012-04-10T15:53:13Z")
You say that like it’s a bad thing, **Paul** … ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/3 "2012-04-10T16:11:13Z")
Sister Scary, quite contrary, Complained of porn, you know. With lovely lads, and cock-ring ads, And the Church said, “She has to go.” ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/4 "2012-04-10T16:35:21Z")
I wonder if any of those magazines had a nautical theme. You know, _Nuns and Cans_. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/5 "2012-04-10T17:34:36Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > [Philly.com](http://Philly.com) is reporting a nun was called to testify in court in the sex abuse trial. She said a certain priest had pornographic magazines delivered to a church office she ran for the priest. She said she was moved from her position when she mentioned the problem. > > Her name is Joan Scary. That is to say her name is **Sister Scary.** > > That is all. Out of curiosity and not to kill the joke, but all the nuns I’ve ever known went by their first name. So it’d be Sister Joan for me. Is this not the usual case? ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/6 "2012-04-10T18:07:59Z")
> [@Balance](#): > > Sister Scary, quite contrary, > Complained of porn, you know. > With lovely lads, and cock-ring ads, > And the Church said, “She has to go.” You had to go and ruin it with an 8-syllable closing stanza, didn’t you? _Ahem…_ Sister Scary, quite contrary, Complained of porn, you know. With lovely lads, and cock-ring ads, The Church said, “She must go.” ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/7 "2012-04-10T20:05:37Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > You had to go and ruin it with an 8-syllable closing stanza, didn’t you? Direct parallel with the line it was based it on: “And pretty maids all in a row.” ---
**Author:** ![Agent\_Foxtrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc29f/32.png) [@Agent\_Foxtrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Agent_Foxtrot)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2012, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/8 "2012-04-11T19:56:54Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > You had to go and ruin it with an 8-syllable closing stanza, didn’t you? _Ahem…_ > > Sister Scary, quite contrary, > Complained of porn, you know. > With lovely lads, and cock-ring ads, > The Church said, “She must go.” Regardless, brilliant! ---
**Author:** ![handsomeharry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e9c0ed/32.png) [@handsomeharry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handsomeharry)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2012, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/9 "2012-04-11T23:38:49Z")
When I read the title, I thought she had been involved in a traffic accident. ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2012, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/10 "2012-04-12T00:07:42Z")
What does porn have to do with sexual abuse? Or was he showing it to kids or something? ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2012, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/11 "2012-04-12T00:27:26Z")
> [@rachelellogram](#): > > What does porn have to do with sexual abuse? Or was he showing it to kids or something? According to [this article](http://articles.philly.com/2012-04-10/news/31319148_1_sexually-abusive-priests-catholic-priest-gormley), her testimony was taken for the purpose of establishing a pattern of coverups on the part of church officials. She discovered that the priest who received the porn (which may or may not have been child porn–the article doesn’t say) had a previous conviction on child porn charges. When she tried to bring this up to church officials, she was warned to drop the matter, and later fired. The priest in question isn’t the one on trial, by the way. The defendants are a priest accused of attempting to rape a boy and a cardinal charged with covering up sexual abuse of minors by priests. Neither is directly implicated by Sister Joan’s testimony. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2012, 7:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-nun-in-court/618373/12 "2012-04-12T07:56:03Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Out of curiosity and not to kill the joke, but all the nuns I’ve ever known went by their first name. So it’d be Sister Joan for me. Is this not the usual case? Depends on the context. The Clarisas I visit go by firstname; the Slaves of the Sacred Heart in my hometown go by firstname except for three of them which happen to share a firstname (the one who’s been there longest uses the firstname, the others go by last); my teachers went by lastname - but so did many of the teachers who weren’t nuns. I lived through the years during which “mister Berrueta” became “Adolfo”; the newer nuns would go by Mother Firstname but those who’d been in town longer (and in many cases taught my classmates’ mothers) kept the Mother Lastname to avoid confusion.