MOTHER KNOWS BEST

WATCH OUT, LIBERALS. THE MOST INFLUENTIAL CATHOLIC WOMAN IN AMERICA HAS HER OWN TELEVISION NETWORK

With her ample jowls and round, beamish face, she looks a bit like Benny Hill--without, of course, the late British comic's leering smirk. Her voice is high-pitched, nasal and a trifle slurred, her frequent laugh a piercing cackle. At a time when some Roman Catholic nuns wear discreet designer clothes, she is resolutely old-fashioned in her ankle-length brown robe and hair-concealing white scapular. The Catholicism she espouses is old-fashioned as well, redolent with devotion to the Virgin Mary and the Latin-rite mass, deeply rooted in the Baltimore Catholicism of the 1940s. Some critics call her "the zinging nun" for her forthright...

Want the full story?

Subscribe Now

Subscribe
Subscribe

Learn more about the benefits of being a TIME subscriber

If you are already a subscriber sign up — registration is free!