US Catholics continue to wrestle with the political fallout from the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that had established a constitutional right to procure an abortion.
In Chicago, a state Senator Sara Feigenholtz posted a cartoon on social media depicting a bishop pointing a gun at a pregnant Statue of Liberty. The Council of Religious Leaders of Metropolitan Chicago condemned the cartoon, saying, “Regardless of our personal or political views on abortion, bigotry has no place in our community….As a Council composed of almost every religious tradition in Chicago, we cannot accept the demonisation of any faith community.”
“We must not tolerate hate speech against any group in society, for history has shown that when it goes unchallenged it can become normalized,” a written statement from the Archdiocese of Chicago said. Vandals continued to attack pro-life crisis pregnancy centres, smashing doors and windows, and painting pro-abortion messages on the buildings. This week, two centres in Massachusetts and one in New Hampshire were attacked.
Gloria Purvis, a Black pro-life leader, criticised pro-abortion groups that highlight racial disparities in heath care to justify making abortion available. “A Black woman who is poor and gets an abortion will still be poor, still live in a food desert, still lack insurance,” Purvis wrote. “After an abortion, she will still be in the circumstances that abortion advocates claim make motherhood too burdensome. According to all indicators, Black women have had plenty of abortions, and yet we are still poorer, sicker and more economically distressed than white women. We have had the abortions prescribed as a curative, and they have not been healing but toxic.”
President Joe Biden issued an executive order aimed at guaranteeing access to emergency contraception and medicinal abortions. Biden rejected calls from pro-abortion groups that he allow abortion providers to use federal property in states where abortion is banned.
Archbishop William Lori, chair of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, issued a statement opposing the president’s actions. “Rather than using the power of the executive branch to increase support and care to mothers and babies, the president’s executive order seeks only to facilitate the destruction of defenceless, voiceless human beings,” Lori said.
•Seven people were killed and dozens wounded, when a gunman opened fire at a July 4 parade in Highland Park, Illinois. Cardinal Blase Cupich celebrated Mass the next day near the site of the attack, “The right to bear arms does not eclipse the right to life, or the right of all Americans to go about their lives free of the fear that they might be shredded by bullets at any moment,” Cupich said. “Gun violence is a life issue. We must continue to pray that all our officials, elected and unelected alike, will redouble their commitment to keeping safe the people they have sworn to serve.” The U.S. Conference of Catholic bishops also called for legislative action, repeating their support for a ban on assault weapons.
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