Kendra Tierney: A Martyr for Catholicism All Year

[anachronistic]

We have been discussing the Tierneys over in the M is for Mama thread and I think she deserves her own thread, so here one is. Mods, feel free to change the title if you don’t like it.

Kendra Tierney lives in an enormous mansion in LA. She has 10 kids whose names I can’t get straight because sometimes she uses nicknames and sometimes not, but they’re in age from 17/18 to a baby. They are all perfectly adorable (especially the baby) with no faults that I can see except that they have the tendency to suck up to their narcissistic mom a lot. Kendra has a ton of money because her husband is some high up at some medical company. She’s a diehard Catholic, as in, has recently said that she would be willing to die because she wants to get communion /confession so much but the evil government hasn’t given churches permission to open for sacraments yet, even though getting those things is just as essential as a grocery store or a hospital. Kendra homeschools about 2/3 of the kids then sends them at about age 12/13 to the only good Catholic school she’s found. 
 

Kendras big thing is that she is Catholic every single day of the year and that she is a better Catholic than all those other Catholics. Her liturgical calendar is 100% filled with saints days, feasts days, fast days, you name it. She makes decorations and everyone dresses up and they do special things for every holiday she can find. As someone said in the Braggie thread, it’s more than a little pagan. (Sorry I can’t remember for attribution here.) Kendra’s goal is to raise her kids to go to heaven, the good, Catholic heaven, and how you get there apparently involves many rituals like not having meat on some days and marching around with palms on other days and only taking communion on the tongue. As expected, she’s very into the boys-and-girls-totally-different-beings thing, so her boys can be altar servers but her oldest daughter gets to sell donuts with the old ladies instead which is just! as! good! Oh, and she believes in absolute obedience physical discipline of kids starting when they’re babies. Like with many fundies, I really, really, really pity her kids, especially the oldest girl.

 

Kendra blogs and sells stuff at https://catholicallyear.com/

She tweets at https://twitter.com/kendra_tierney?ref_src=twsrc^google|twcamp^serp|twgr^author

And instagrams at https://www.instagram.com/kendra_tierney/?hl=en

 

Edited May 12, 2020 by Coconut Flan

[mysweetetc]

Anyone have a complete list of her kids' names? I know she has a Midge, which is interesting. I assume she's a Margaret, and that they are all named after saints?

[therulesofjinx]

3 minutes ago, mysweetetc said:

Anyone have a complete list of her kids' names? I know she has a Midge, which is interesting. I assume she's a Margaret, and that they are all named after saints?

I think Midge is actually Mary Jane!

Yes, it is,  I found a list  including meanings on a Catholic baby naming blog I like to read sometimes (solely because I have an interest in names):

John Paul nn Jack (“named for Pope St. JPII“)
Elizabeth Jeanne nn Betty (“named for my grandmother and my sister in law“)
Robert Benedict nn Bobby (“named for three of Jim and my grandfathers and Pope Benedict XVI“)
Augustine James nn Gus (“named for St. Augustine and my father in law“)
Anita Camille (“named for my grandmother and my mother“)
Francis Patrick nn Frankie (“named for St. Francis and my brother in law“)
Louise Marita nn Lulu (“named for our neighbor/adopted great grandmother and my mother in law“)
Mary Jane nn Midge (“named for our Blessed Mother“)
George Curtis (“named for my uncle and my father“)

The baby is Barbara Josephine, I think.

[JermajestyDuggar]

Don’t forget her very own chapel in her mansion! 

[AmericanRose]

Apparently she started the blog because of the woman who yelled at her in church back in 2013, which she figured people would want to hear about... and she wrote about it. From the point of view of the baby. The self-congratulating is something.

[Red Hair, Black Dress]

Kendra also has a Facebook --  https://www.facebook.com/catholicallyear/ -- where you can find a link to her blog about wanting the Eucharist Now!! and the 100s and 100s of FB comments about the blog post (running 50-50 pro/con).

She yaks on in waaaaay too much detail about all her children, especially "Cranky Frankie" (her name for him) -- so absolutely not her favorite child.

Her mansion, formerly with 10 bedrooms, was reduced to 4 bedrooms by Kendra because no child ever needs or should have a room to him/her self = girls in one bedroom, boys in the other., parents' bedroom, 1 guest room.  The other 6 bedrooms were turned into who knows what but do include a consecrated home chapel as Kendra is just that special.

I'll let you all discover Kendra yourself through her own words on all her many, many media sites.

 

 

Edited May 12, 2020 by Red Hair, Black Dress

[princessmahina]

44 minutes ago, therulesofjinx said:

I think Midge is actually Mary Jane!

Yes, it is,  I found a list  including meanings on a Catholic baby naming blog I like to read sometimes (solely because I have an interest in names):

John Paul nn Jack (“named for Pope St. JPII“)
Elizabeth Jeanne nn Betty (“named for my grandmother and my sister in law“)
Robert Benedict nn Bobby (“named for three of Jim and my grandfathers and Pope Benedict XVI“)
Augustine James nn Gus (“named for St. Augustine and my father in law“)
Anita Camille (“named for my grandmother and my mother“)
Francis Patrick nn Frankie (“named for St. Francis and my brother in law“)
Louise Marita nn Lulu (“named for our neighbor/adopted great grandmother and my mother in law“)
Mary Jane nn Midge (“named for our Blessed Mother“)
George Curtis (“named for my uncle and my father“)

The baby is Barbara Josephine, I think.

I loooove Sancta Nomina (assuming that’s the naming blog you’re talking about). I don’t like a lot of the things she suggests, but I enjoy reading about baby names. 

[mysweetetc]

Oh wow. She makes her kids wear uniforms for homeschool. One of the benefits of homeschooling (in my experience, anyway) is that you don't have to conform to ridiculous dress codes. But it looks "cuter." Okay, Kendra.

[PennySycamore]

31 minutes ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

Don’t forget her very own chapel in her mansion! 

If she has her own chapel, why doesn't she hire her own priest like the Von Trapp's hired Father Wasner?   That way she could go to communion every day and confession as often as she wished.  People that have over-scrupulous consciences tend to drive their priests nuts though.  

[JermajestyDuggar]

Just now, PennySycamore said:

If she has her own chapel, why doesn't she hire her own priest like the Von Trapp's hired Father Wasner?   That way she could go to communion every day and confession as often as she wished.  People that have over-scrupulous consciences tend to drive their priests nuts though.  

I would love to know what her priest really thinks of her!

[therulesofjinx]

59 minutes ago, princessmahina said:

I loooove Sancta Nomina (assuming that’s the naming blog you’re talking about)

yup, that's exactly it  

I've been following Kendra for a few years. I'm so excited she has a thread here now

[Red Hair, Black Dress]

The Tierneys attend an Opus Dei parish -- her priest is probably just as overly scrupulous as she is, perhaps more so.

[anachronistic]

Among the many, many, many things that I don’t get about Kendra:

- what do her kids have to confess? They never do anything!

- does she think all Protestants are going to hell?

- are the personal guardian angels like little Caspers? Because that’s how I picture them, little friendly ghosts following her kids around, weeping when she spanks them.

- did she miss the part where calendars have changed frequently over the years so that her liturgical calendar doesn’t line up when the saints were born, stuff happened (assuming it did) etc?

- why exactly are they so special that their kids first holy whatever’s have to be in Rome, administered by the Pope? There are millions of Catholics but they literally go to the Vatican and try to talk their way into mass? It wasn’t their prayers, it was money, being white/having white privilege, and being *entitled as feck all* that got them there.

- why does she say that such and such a baby was a good baby? I’ve met tons of babies, I love babies, I will go up to total strangers and admire their babies, and I’ve yet to meet a bad baby. Are bad babies the ones who haven’t had the special sprinkle of water?

[ignorantobserver]

3 hours ago, Red Hair, Black Dress said:

Her mansion, formerly with 10 bedrooms, was reduced to 4 bedrooms by Kendra because no child ever needs or should have a room to him/her self = girls in one bedroom, boys in the other., parents' bedroom, 1 guest room.  The other 6 bedrooms were turned into who knows what but do include a consecrated home chapel as Kendra is just that special.

 

This is absolutely disgusting and vile. Not only depriving her children of individual space and quiet, but going out of her way to cram them together and refurniture bedrooms ?

Sorry, I find this a lot more upsetting and problematic than physical punishment or religious guilt-tripping : those children are never allowed to be alone. Ever. Unlike children who are "only" abused, neglected or ignored, they can't hide, isolate themselves, develop a secret life of their own. They are not allowed to build a safe space inside their head. And in this case, it's deliberate cruelty from their mother. JillR has at least the excuse of being poor.

Some of these parents really make my blood boil. I hope she gets punished for this. I hope all of her children shun her and she dies alone. Not very christian... but I hope something hurts her, badly. I hope she comes to regret deeply what she did to those innocents.

Edited May 12, 2020 by ignorantobserver
punctuation

[Red Hair, Black Dress]

Remember that girls in one room means her 16-year old daughter (aka SisterMom) shares a room with her 4 sisters, including the 7-month old baby.

Her 18-year old son shares with 4 brothers, including the 2-year old George -- recently recovered from meningitis. 

She's said her son gets to go off to college, provided he continues his 1:1 Opus Dei personal counselling session (an Opus Dei requirement?) and that Kendra and hubby are convinced he's behaving himself and not doing anything they disapprove of. Which seems to be everything.

LIke most fundies Knedra and hubby sort of plan to not allow their children something they had -- both went away to college. Kendra to U So Cal and hubby to Harvard.

Edited May 13, 2020 by Red Hair, Black Dress

[JanasTattooParlor]

6 hours ago, princessmahina said:

I loooove Sancta Nomina (assuming that’s the naming blog you’re talking about). I don’t like a lot of the things she suggests, but I enjoy reading about baby names. 

Reading this post has sent me down the Catholic naming rabbit hole! I’ve been reading this blog on and off while doing work this afternoon/evening, and it’s so interesting!! My fiancé’s family is Catholic, though most of them consider themselves “recovering Catholics” that still observe Lent every year out of habit, and it’s so interesting to see the name choices that people have and that the blogger suggests. Some I've never heard of and some seem so off the wall religious that I feel like the people who name their kids that would be like the parents who named their daughter Heistheway. Thank you for the amazing new time killer during this quarantine/work from home time!!!

[AliceInFundyland]

Oh wow. I don't know if I've ever encountered a mommy blogger who was so unapologetic about her use of training/spanking.

.. I searched "discipline."

In detail. On the babies. ?

Edited May 13, 2020 by AliceInFundyland

[Red Hair, Black Dress]

She doesn't use the 1/4 inch plumbing line or blanket training, but Kendra's discipline sounds like 99% of the fundies we discuss on FJ. 

She tries to make it sound reasonable and that it's just being a responsible parent raising "good" children, but really she hitting them to make them stop doing something.  Notice she never says what she use for the bottom spankings.

"Hand spanking" my eye -- she's just smacking them hard on the hand until the child stops doing whatever a 6-9 month old does.  And she seriously thinks a 9-month old is intentional in his/her misbehavior? Shades of Voddie Baucham.

[NachosFlandersStyle]

4 hours ago, ignorantobserver said:

This is absolutely disgusting and vile. Not only depriving her children of individual space and quiet, but going out of her way to cram them together and refurniture bedrooms ?

I agree. There's a lot of stuff I could take issue with (hyper-conservative Catholics always drive me up the wall) but for some reason the floor plan is the thing I can't shake. They obviously have more than enough money and space to at least group the teens away from the toddlers, but instead she goes out of her way (and spends a boatload of money) to force them into this Von Trapp fantasy. Same with the college thing-- I can sympathize with a poorer family worried that they might not be able to afford their kids' education, but they're totally able to afford it and are simply dangling the possibility that they could cut their kids off in order to keep them in line.

Reading some of her home reno or vacation posts makes me the same kind of angry that I feel with a lot of Catholic stuff-- she spends all her time going on and on about privileged and frivolous things, then turns around and acts like some sort of sage moral authority. 

P.S. does anyone know if she was raised Catholic? These types often weren't.

 

[princessmahina]

6 minutes ago, NachosFlandersStyle said:

I agree. There's a lot of stuff I could take issue with (hyper-conservative Catholics always drive me up the wall) but for some reason the floor plan is the thing I can't shake. They obviously have more than enough money and space to at least group the teens away from the toddlers, but instead she goes out of her way (and spends a boatload of money) to force them into this Von Trapp fantasy. Same with the college thing-- I can sympathize with a poorer family worried that they might not be able to afford their kids' education, but they're totally able to afford it and are simply dangling the possibility that they could cut their kids off in order to keep them in line.

Reading some of her home reno or vacation posts makes me the same kind of angry that I feel with a lot of Catholic stuff-- she spends all her time going on and on about privileged and frivolous things, then turns around and acts like some sort of sage moral authority. 

P.S. does anyone know if she was raised Catholic? These types often weren't.

 

She was raised Catholic, but not the Catholicky Catholic she is now. She makes it pretty clear that she doesn’t approve of the way she was raised in earlier posts and that her parents used some form of contraception. 

 

2 hours ago, JanasTattooParlor said:

Reading this post has sent me down the Catholic naming rabbit hole! I’ve been reading this blog on and off while doing work this afternoon/evening, and it’s so interesting!! My fiancé’s family is Catholic, though most of them consider themselves “recovering Catholics” that still observe Lent every year out of habit, and it’s so interesting to see the name choices that people have and that the blogger suggests. Some I've never heard of and some seem so off the wall religious that I feel like the people who name their kids that would be like the parents who named their daughter Heistheway. Thank you for the amazing new time killer during this quarantine/work from home time!!!

I gave my son ones of those over the top Catholic names ? Nothing as crazy as Heistheway though! 

[JMarie]

I don't get her reasons for uniforms at home. She says it cuts down on laundry because the kids wear their Monday outfits on Tuesday, and their Wednesday outfits on Thursday.  Um, they could do that with regular clothes.  And she says it's too difficult for her kids to decide what to wear, so she makes that decision for them.  If it's that much of a struggle, she could lay out an outfit for everyone the night before. FWIW, I went to Catholic school, and I liked wearing a uniform. My mom took me shopping in August, one uniform, five blouses, five pairs of socks, one pair of shoes. In high school especially, I felt like uniforms were the great equalizer.  Everyone looked the same: girls from wealthier parishes, girls from struggling parishes, athletic girls, nerdy girls, popular girls.  College was a bit of a shock for me.

[anjulibai]

I don't understand why she couldn't have just split the kids up age and gender wise. Why not have the four bedrooms instead of 2 and "dressing rooms"? 

[NachosFlandersStyle]

38 minutes ago, JMarie said:

I felt like uniforms were the great equalizer.  Everyone looked the same: girls from wealthier parishes, girls from struggling parishes, athletic girls, nerdy girls, popular girls.

Ahh, I hated uniforms! At my school it made clothes a bigger deal than they needed to be. I felt like my appearance was being scrutinized 24/7 and I spent a ton of time in detention for untucked shirts and mismatched socks. Meanwhile it seemed like certain kids could get away with whatever. I think it's only an equalizer if there's a strong and intentional dedication to treating it that way, and often there isn't.

[SolomonFundy]

I'm absolute vintage-aesthetic trash, so I've always liked Kendra's home decor and naming choices. 

But if The Upside Down had been a mid-century themed pedantry pageant, Kendra Tierney would be the Demogorgon. 

[TuringMachine]

Kind of a tangent here, but looking at her list of kids after looking at Courtney's kids really puts her crazy pacing into perspective. It took Kendra 17? 18? years to have 10 kids. Courtney did it in 10. 

 

Anyway back to Kendra's terrible parenting.

3 hours ago, NachosFlandersStyle said:

I can sympathize with a poorer family worried that they might not be able to afford their kids' education, but they're totally able to afford it and are simply dangling the possibility that they could cut their kids off in order to keep them in line.

Yup. What abusive shitheads. If I were to point to any one thing that differs with all the people we follow from the way I was raised, it's that my parents greatest goal was to provide me with as many opportunities as they could, while all these people try give their kids as few as they can. It boggles my mind and breaks my heart every time.