Promulgating Joy and Expiating Guilt: Camp and LGBTQ+ Health Education in the History of The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.

Abstract

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence (The Sisters) have engaged in health education and promotion for more than 40 years, yet their contributions remain underexplored in public health literature. This article examines the role of camp, humor, and joy in their work by drawing on primary sources from the San Francisco, California, and Boston, Massachusetts, Sisters' archives, as well as publicly available interviews. The Sisters published one of the first safer-sex pamphlets in the United States, written by and for gay men, using camp and setting a precedent for community-led health education. Since then, they have continued to leverage public health knowledge-sourced from health professionals within their order, local health organizations, and public agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-while using camp to make it accessible, engaging, and quintessentially queer. The Sisters exemplify how serious public health initiatives can be conducted with queer pride, humor, and joy. (<i>Am J Public Health</i>. 2025;115(9):1536-1544. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2025.308112).