Mónica turns the corner and appears on a sunny Saturday in January on Rivadavia Avenue. She's lived in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Flores for two years. She wears her hair tied back, a blue T-shirt, denim shorts, and beige sandals. Her appearance and small stature shouldn't attract attention, but she has one trait that sets her apart from the rest of the passersby: a big smile. It's a gesture she wears most of the time. She travels to Borda Hospital. She arrives around 8:30 a.m., carrying a pack of ten cigarettes and alfajores of various flavors. It's the birthday present Marcela, "Rompecoches," a 54-year-old trans woman who has been hospitalized for six months at the public hospital, asked for. When Mónica arrives, Marcela is already awake, although she didn't go to breakfast like the rest of her roommates, all of whom are men. "How long will they last?" she challenges her as she hands her the pack.

Marcela is the antithesis of Mónica. She's enormous and curvaceous. She has a thick mane of curly hair, a perfect upturned nose, and V-shaped eyebrows, reminiscent of actress Graciela Borges. She earned her nickname when, one day, she furiously smashed a patrol car in the middle of one of the frequent fights she and her colleagues had with police officers while working as sex workers at Panamericana. 

She's lying down, and after a while she asks us for help to sit up. She does so carefully: her bottom hurts when she sits down. 

"For all that they've put on themselves," the ex-sister reproaches her. 

"We didn't know, Monica. Anyway... how many things this line has given me." He laughs. He has a dry sense of humor. He recently had two strokes. He moves with difficulty, although he feels better than he did a few weeks ago. He's in a good mood, smiles, and talks eagerly. 

When Mónica says goodbye and goes over to give her a kiss, Marcela asks for "two, like in Paris." "Her classmates say she was mean. Imagine, they called her 'the car wrecker.' But she's changed a lot. She texts me 'I love you.' I don't think they could have imagined it."

A clean bed to die in 

Mónica Astorga Cremona was born on December 3, 1964, at Piñero Hospital in Buenos Aires. When she was three, her parents separated, and she went to live with her mother in Rauch, in the heart of Buenos Aires. She's 60 years old, but doesn't look it; she has almost no wrinkles. Under her habit, she was able to control the curls she never liked. Today, she wears straight, black hair, the closest thing she could have to a veil. When she told her family she was no longer a nun, they told her they wouldn't be able to see her without her vestments. Until now, they haven't been able to. 

She dedicated most of her life to service within the monastery run by the Order of the Discalced Carmelites in the province of Neuquén, where she rose to become Mother Superior for two three-year terms. Today, she continues her vocation outside the Order: forty years after entering the monastery, she was forced to request her release. She was a cloistered or contemplative nun, meaning that her life was framed within the monastery, where she dedicated herself to prayer and the search for union with God. Previously, they were called "locked-up nuns." Throughout her life, she accompanied people with problematic substance abuse and those no one wanted to visit, such as those sentenced to life imprisonment. She did this by sending letters to their prisons. Until 2006, she met first one, then four, and finally dozens of transvestites and trans people from the city of Neuquén.

“One day, Romina, a classmate from San Juan, came and told us that she had gone to the Lourdes church to leave her tithe, but they didn't accept it because it came from prostitution. There, she met a nun and a priest who introduced her to another sister: Mónica. And she wanted to meet us. Us… you can imagine. What can a nun do for us, who lived on the run from the police or were arrested? But we went to meet her. I'm very Catholic. There were four of us: Victoria, Luján, Romina, and me.” The speaker is Katiana Villagra, a 62-year-old trans woman. She arrived in Neuquén when she was 22 after wandering around different parts of Buenos Aires. She didn't like it. The heels and socks that had been impeccably worn on the asphalt were worn out on the side of the road, with the cobblestone streets and the relentless wind. She was one of the first to arrive, but soon it was filled with transvestites and trans people from different provinces: there were more from outside than from Neuquén.

—Why were they going to Neuquén?

—In Buenos Aires at that time, they would detain you for 30, 60, 90 days. We had no rights. The good thing about Neuquén was that they didn't detain us. And if they did, the operation lasted 24 hours. There was a time, later on, when they did start detaining us every day. But by then, I was already a citizen of Neuquén and had chosen this place. If you drink water from the Limay River, you're stuck.

Over the years, Katiana continued to work on the streets, had silicone implants, and considered herself an activist. She was 40 when she met Mónica. 

— The sister was tiny, but beautiful. The first thing she asked us was what our dreams were. Luján told her she would have liked to finish her degree and study to be a chef; other classmates, that they wanted to be hairdressers; and another was studying massages and those kinds of things. I remember that when she asked me, I told her I wanted “a clean bed to die in ” I hadn't realized what I'd said had affected her so much. At that time, we were in the AIDS epidemic and in the hospital, when they couldn't do anything more for the classmates with HIV, they would discharge you and give you a hospital bed so you could go home to die. And we didn't have a home! So you went to another classmate's house. We would give her the IV drip where we'd been smoking, using drugs, drinking alcohol before going to work. And the classmate was there among us. Whenever I saw the sheets, they were dirty. That's why I wanted a clean bed to die in. Because I was already old enough.

At 40, Katiana already felt close to death. She knew that the average lifespan of the transvestite and transgender community to which she belongs was—and still is today—around 35 years. Today, at 62, she is a survivor. 

That conversation sparked an obsession for Monica. 

Hard years

At age 7, she first had the desire to become a nun. She lived with her mother, María Vilma, in a precarious, old house with high ceilings and tiled roofs. The woman worked in a restaurant in Rauch. While she slaughtered and plucked chickens, Mónica peeled the potatoes, which piled up in drawers throughout the house. Because she wore new smocks and school supplies every year, the school ignored the situation at home, where several times a week they went without food. It was a gift from her father, who sent her once a year just enough money—no more, no less—to buy what she needed for school. She also saw him once a year, for the holidays. Although he sometimes sent her toys, Mónica made her own. In one room she set up a pharmacy, in another she ran a business, and in the dining room, she served as a teacher. A neighbor's antenna had been installed in the yard of her house. He would climb it until he reached the roof of his house, from where he would spend hours observing the town from above while making crosses with a string. 

“Those were difficult years; we were managing on our own. She was an alcoholic. I begged her to please not die because I didn't know what she would do on her own. We lived with very little. And yet, she always told me: 'If someone comes to this house asking for something, they can't leave empty-handed.' When I told her as a little girl that I wanted to be a nun, she listened and started sending me to two sisters who worked in a hospital. I would go play with them,” she shares, sitting in her living room, while preparing a mate. 

Things didn't get any easier after that. When he finished elementary school, he went to live with some aunts and uncles in the Flores neighborhood of Buenos Aires. They told him he wouldn't want for anything. 

“ It was all a lie. I became their servant. They gave me money that wasn't enough to buy school supplies, so I started working. I gave half of my salary to them and the rest went to school. Those were years of being very sad and angry, but I always showed myself well, with a smile. I don't think anyone could have imagined it. A friend at the time asked me if I wanted to join a group at a church. I told her I didn't want to know anything; I was angry with God. She insisted. For me, since I was a child, the church was a refuge, and when I finally went, I felt the same way I felt when I entered Rauch's church,” she says.

That year, the religious group he started attending was traveling to Neuquén. He didn't tell any of his family and traveled there by train. "When I arrived, what struck me was that it was a very, very poor neighborhood," he says.

The convent she arrived at was the Monastery of the Holy Cross and Saint Joseph of the Order of the Discalced Carmelites. Founded in 1982, it was the first convent dedicated to the contemplative life in Neuquén. It was two small prefabricated houses where an austere daily routine was carried out. Each nun had a room and a fruit crate in which they stored their clothes. Monica moved to a place with these characteristics at the age of 20. That December she spent the best Christmas of her life.

“I felt like it was my place, like I had lived there my whole life,” he says. 

Twenty days after entering the convent, she was informed that her mother had been urgently admitted due to hemorrhage. By then, the family was supposed to be left behind upon entering Carmel, but her mother superior insisted she go see her. 

“I traveled in March. I was exhausted: uterine cancer. That's when she told me, 'I see you're happy. You're where you always wanted to be.' She was the only one who knew what I wanted. Everything I am is because of my mom.”

Convent life

At the convent, Monica woke up at six-thirty in the morning. Along with the other sisters, they prayed communally, followed by an hour-long individual prayer session. This was followed by Mass, breakfast, and the first part of their workday. They cleaned, made crafts, and sold Del Carmelo . They prayed and ate lunch together in silence. They washed dishes and had an hour of recreation time together. During this time, Monica shared with the others the news she had read the night before, mostly crime stories, a habit she had learned from accompanying prisoners. A short ten-minute prayer followed, and then they could go for a walk, rest, or read. She usually chose a walk, followed by a bath and a short nap before returning to work. They had community formation, a second hour of prayer, and a half-hour prayer session together, with psalms and readings. To make the day shorter, they decided to have a spoken dinner, so they could combine recreation time with lunch. The last prayer of the day followed, and everyone retired to their rooms. "That's when I started with the whole trans thing, social media, answering things," Mónica says.

When he entered Carmel, he vowed two things: that he wouldn't lose his joy and that he would keep his feet on the ground. "For me, praying for 'all those who suffer, for all the world' wasn't a good idea. I wanted to be able to touch those people. I wanted to bring their faces to prayer," he says.

She began using her break time, in the middle of the day, to meet with the women. In those conversations, Monica was impressed by their lives: bullying at school, leaving home, the need to migrate to another province, airplane oil injections to enlarge buttocks and breasts, police persecution. She learned their language and their particular sense of humor and incorporated their codes. Her calm demeanor could quickly harden when the conversation turned into an argument. At those moments, the atmosphere would suddenly turn sour. "How are you going to treat each other like that? You put so much effort into not being men, and in the end you act like them," she once said, furious.

Incorporating technology into the convent was an odyssey. “When the email issue started, I was the first to set one up. A sister had gotten an old computer, and I asked permission for two friends who worked in IT to teach me. I insisted, and a computer was set up in the dining room with a community email account. Everyone could see it. I had a tiny cell phone that some relatives gave me in 2007. I told them I couldn't have it, and they told me to keep it hidden. Why did we have to live hidden? They told you that 'the outside world invaded' if something like that came in,” she says. Mónica's Facebook page became known to LGBTIQ+ activists and journalists covering gender issues. In addition to contacting the trans women who came to her, she kept a tally of the transfemicides, transvesticides, and transhomicides occurring in the country. She religiously posted them whenever she heard about a new one.

After Pope Francis's death, Mónica recalled on her Instagram profile the first letter Francis sent her from Rome. It was in response to another letter Mónica sent to her along with trans women from Neuquén, who wanted to share their good wishes for this new stage. He responded: "Dear Sister Mónica: Now to move forward... with prayer and the work at the frontier that the Lord has placed before you. Tell them from me that I do not condemn them, that I love them, and that from my heart I accompany them on life's journey, praying for them. But please, pray for me. I thank you for praying for me, and that Jesus and the Virgin love you, do not doubt this. I'm leaving you. Please don't forget to pray for me. May Jesus bless you and the Holy Virgin watch over you. Francisco."

“I feel like I've been orphaned. I always told him he was my father, my pastor, my brother, and my friend. He accompanied me in this fight to make trans people visible. He welcomed many of the girls, and he called others on the phone. He always told me, 'Count on me.' He insisted that I tell them that God loved them, that I loved them, that I should never give up, and that he greatly respected the LGBT community,” Mónica told Presentes.

The cooperative

With Katiana's phrase in her head, "a clean bed to die in," she began knocking on doors. Archbishop Marcelo Melani offered a destroyed house, which Caritas renovated, so the girls would have a place to stay when they left the hospital. It filled with trans women and transvestites who gathered to share time. Romina and Victoria opened a hair salon, and Katiana opened a sewing workshop: it wasn't a place to die, but a place to live. 

During those years, Katy was able to leave the streets, but not the alcohol. Every Christmas, she called Mónica, crying and drunk. This was the starting point for another project. The Casa Santa Teresita del Niño Jesús (Saint Therese of the Child Jesus House) was inaugurated in 2019 in the city of Neuquén with the goal of promoting prevention and treatment initiatives to assist trans people with problematic substance use. “It’s Mónica’s work that I will continue as long as I can,” says Kati, who now co-coordinates the institution and hasn’t had a drink in twelve years. 

But Monica had another goal in mind. They needed a place to return to after work and training: a decent home where they could bathe, cook, and rest in a clean bed. 

One day, Kati's words came true. On August 10, 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, the province of Neuquén inaugurated the world's first housing complex for trans women and transvestites. The municipality of Neuquén provided the land, and the provincial government, led by Governor Omar Gutiérrez, carried out the project promoted by Mónica. It consists of twelve studio apartments, along with a multipurpose room, where twelve elderly trans women live.

Those were months of happiness. The women, with their few belongings, began to settle into their new home and improvise living alone with neighbors. Mónica continued to welcome them, now a little more at peace. She knew there weren't enough houses for everyone, but it had been a big step. Christmas arrived, and together with the other nuns of Carmel, they prepared sweets with a message that they distributed to every house in the neighborhood. There's a selfie that shows Mónica in the foreground and three sisters, all smiling, as they deliver the gift. "We had a Christmas where I didn't know what was coming," she says.

Discrimination 

On December 22, 2020, Bishop Fernando Croxatto visited Mónica's monastery for a fraternal visit. "It's something that's usually done, different from the canonical visit that is carried out when there is a serious case for certain accusations," Mónica explains. 

After speaking with each of the sisters in the community, the bishop gave feedback on the visit on January 15. That's when his surprise began: he said that pastoral accompaniment was not part of the Teresian charism. In other words, the accompaniment Monica provided with the trans women was not appropriate for a contemplative life. 

“It was based on criticisms made by the other sisters. They said I was never there. I was Mother Superior, and the following year there were elections. They didn't want me there. I hadn't abandoned the care of the monastery or my duties. I did everything in our spare time. They came up with unfounded arguments, and he believed them without question. To this day, no one has asked me what happened,” says the former sister.

She traveled to Buenos Aires, where they lent her an apartment near Congress, until things settled down. “I was in a very bad way; I fell into a depression that was very difficult to recover from,” she says. In February, she had to return to Neuquén. She thought the Order had resolved her situation and that she would return to live in the monastery. “But when I went, they asked me to decide. It was either them or me. So I said I preferred the community to continue, and I would open up. They accepted. In the end, after comings and goings, only three nuns remained in the community. They said they couldn't support her, so the monastery closed.”

Mónica requested admission to the Córdoba convent and remained there for a year and eight months, until December 2022. After a series of questions—"This isn't a trans house," "You arrived with an empty shelf and started filling it with all your things," "Your head is already cut off"—she made the decision to request a dispensation from her religious vows. 

What she considered a betrayal by the other sisters and the bishop in Neuquén, the closure of the monastery she fell in love with at age 20 and where she lived for four decades, the under-the-radar comments and objections to her work at the convent in Córdoba finally led her, before losing her faith, to request her disassociation from the Order. 

"My heart feels broken and bleeding. It was not, nor will it ever be, my desire or will to dispense my vows as a Consecrated Person to Jesus," she posted on Facebook the day the Vatican accepted her request for resignation. 

Pioneer

Brother Miguel Márquez Calle is Father General of the Discalced Carmelites. He met Monica when he was head of the Order in the Iberian Province of Spain. Since then, they met each time he visited Argentina and became friends. 

“I thought it was a very beautiful way it all began. With great respect, they offered a space for listening and acceptance, where they felt they were treated well. Within their own sphere… because she was a contemplative nun. She wasn't an active nun,” she says. Due to her role within the Church, she travels to many places around the world, but on this occasion, she speaks with Presentes by phone from a street in Rome, near Villa Borghese. 

He believes that the accompaniment Mónica had been providing was welcomed within the Order, but it depended on the individual. “I couldn't say if there were people who weren't so supportive or less accepting of the issue. Surely there were some people,” he comments. For him, what happened with Mónica's departure has to do with a trend he's observed in different countries: that communities are decreasing, there are fewer and fewer nuns, and they can't continue. He doesn't believe it's due to the work she was doing with the transvestite and transgender community. “I haven't heard of any reports of her being denounced or reproached for her work. Maybe there was some of that, but I can't confirm it. I think it's true that she has made another life choice.” 

Within the Church, "work is being done, but it's true that there are those who view anything related to issues involving trans people with suspicion," she explains. " There is a faction that can be more moralistic, that has a more implacable judgment regarding trans people, and there is another that accompanies, welcomes, and pursues a process of recognition. I think we need to educate people toward a more communion-in-diversity approach."

Before hanging up the phone to return to her duties, she adds: "I appreciate how she's had to fight since she was little. I don't think there's ever been a valuable, lucid person who has spoken a word that hasn't been discussed or criticized. These are people who are sometimes pioneers and are misunderstood in the times in which they live."

A little relief

A few months ago, while walking through downtown Buenos Aires, Mónica saw a woman lying on the floor next to a grocery store. “Her feet were a mess, and I wondered who would dare to touch them,” Mónica shares at her home, while Roco, a medium-sized white poodle, interrupts her. It was the impetus for her to study podiatry, a tool she now uses to help others. “Most people neglect their feet,” she says. She began attending Borda Hospital for voluntary services for hospitalized patients. There, she met Marcela, whose admission was an exception since the facility is actually reserved for men. “The trans people follow me,” she says, laughing. She also went to the Trans Memory Archive to bring free relief to the veteran women who work there. “After so many years of standing in the street or on the highway, your feet are destroyed,” she says.

In one of the rooms of the apartment where she lives in Caballito, which the Church provided after much insistence, she decided to set up a podiatry practice, where she provides private services. She published her services on her Instagram profile ( @piealiviado ). She did this thanks to the help of "the girls," as she refers to the trans friends she's made over the years. When she shared her idea, they told her: "We'll make sure you have everything."

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She spent last Christmas alone. She dedicated herself to praying for all the people who spent that night alone. “'You're just another trans person,' they tell me. I always say you have to truly understand the pain of others.”