Rachel Mastrogiacomo is pushing back against organizers of the Restore Tradition women’s conference who are now claiming that she simply ran out of time during her remarks and that the content of her speech wasn’t an issue.
“The evidence and eyewitness testimonies of many indicate that the conference organizers took issue with what I had to say, not just how long it took me to say it,” Mastrogiacomo told Integrity Magazine in an exclusive statement.
Mastrogiacomo spoke to Integrity this week after organizers of the conference, which has come under intense scrutiny in recent weeks, sent out yet another email in what appears to be a damage control operation. Mastrogiacomo was removed from the event’s website earlier this month, only to be restored following public outcry. A thorough explanation as to why she was removed and added back has not yet been provided by lead organizer Jane Brennan.
Conference organizers sent an email to attendees on Monday, October 19. Integrity was forwarded the communication. The email denies that Mastrogiacomo was “ordered cut off by the parish pastor or anyone from the Archdiocese of Denver.” It also rejects the claim that she was “intentionally prevented from telling her story, and that she was removed from the stage.”
The email also states that Mastrogiacomo was scheduled to speak for 75 minutes from 1:30-2:45 pm on Saturday, September 26 followed by a 30-minute break. Organizers maintain that she started speaking at “approximately 1:38 pm” until the “emcee gently interrupts” her just under 54 minutes into her remarks. The reason that was given for the interruption was that time was running short and Mastrogiacomo had yet to explain “how she found healing through the Traditional Latin Mass.”
The statement continues by noting that at 2:45pm “the emcee politely and apologetically informs her that her time has ended and she is welcome to speak with the women in the hallway.”
Organizers further allege that neither the parish’s priest, Fr. Matthew McCarthy, FSSP, “nor anyone from the Archdiocese of Denver ordered Rachel’s speech to be cut short. Anyone making that assertion is misinformed and mistaken. Rachel was not prevented from telling the especially difficult parts of her story, nor was she repeatedly interrupted, nor was she in any way physically removed from the stage.”
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While details regarding the time constraints of Mastrogiacomo’s speech are greatly appreciated, the organizer’s statement still fails to provide much needed transparency on why Mastrogiacomo was removed from the website in the first place. It also fails to correct past public statements that have been made about Mastrogiacomo’s remarks by persons close to the conference, most notably Brennan’s own daughter.
On a Facebook post published by Chris Jackson earlier this month, a woman named Carly Elaine identified herself as Brennan’s daughter published a comment. In it, she blamed Mastrogiacomo for not abiding by the event’s guidelines. “You crossed a line, and you know that you did,” Elaine said. “There was plenty of communication with you beforehand about the topics they were not comfortable having discussed at this conference, and those boundaries were made clear. You chose to blatantly disregard that direction,” she added, implying that she had been cut short due to the content of her remarks. Elaine said nothing about Mastrogiacomo running short on time.
The Dispatch
X user Helen Adelaide echoed Elaine’s accusation. On October 2, she published a post on the platform claiming that Mastrogiacomo had run out of time but that she also “violated … the terms of her agreed to talk” and that she also violated “the copyright of the group’s logo.”
It is not clear how Adelaide, who seems to be the owner of the website Kish & Company, knows these things, though it appears she has some affiliation with the conference organizers given that she has been sharing their statements about Mastrogiacomo to her X account over the past several weeks.
Catholic influencer Fred Simon asked Adelaide on X why Mastrogiacomo was removed from the event’s website. Adelaide insinuated that she was taken off because of some past legal indiscretions. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Have you ever looked into Mastrogiacomo’s publicly available court records?” she asked.
To repeat, in their October 19 email, event organizers claimed that the sole problem with Mastrogiacomo’s remarks was that she simply ran out of time. Why, then, did Brennan’s own daughter jump into the fray on social media to accuse Mastrogiacomo of disregarding conference guidelines? Why, moreover, did Helen Adelaide allege that Mastrogiacomo “violated … the terms of her agreed to talk”? Organizer’s are yet to address these claims directly. If they are false, then organizers should correct the record and deny them outright, as they only serve to fuel speculation and harm Mastrogiacomo’s public reputation. If they are true, then organizer’s should explain where in Mastrogiacomo’s address she “chose to blatantly disregard” the “topics they were not comfortable having discussed at this conference,” as Brennan’s daughter maintained on Facebook.
The situation is made all the more bizarre given that on a phone call between Mastrogiacomo and Brennan prior to the conference, Brennan specifically told her “you don’t have to provide me with the outline [of your speech] … I have full confidence that you can tell your story the way you want to tell it, and it’ll be fine.”
Moreover, conference speaker Abby Johnson said in a post on Mastrogiacomo’s Facebook wall earlier this month that McCarthy “asked for [Mastrogiacomo] to be removed from the stage. It was not the conference organizers. They were doing what the priest [Fr. McCarthy] asked them to.” Yet, the organizer’s October 19 email denies this. It is unclear how Johnson came to be convinced that McCarthy orchestrated the affair.
Mastrogiacomo told Integrity this week that she is looking to the future. “While I have moved on from this, the truth remains important out of respect for the conference attendees and faithful Catholics who deserve transparency,” she explained.
One would have hoped that Remnant Newspaper editor Michael Matt, who spoke at the conference just after Mastrogiacomo, would help bring a resolution to the matter given his desire to “unite the clans.” But on a recent Remnant Underground podcast, he sidestepped the issue, simply noting that it “wasn’t my conference” while opting to not bring up Mastrogiacomo’s name.
For respectful comments only:
- Restore Tradition Women’s Conference website; Jane Brennan, Organizer: authenticwoman5@gmail.com; (720) 354-6459
