Priests for Life slammed House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi in an open letter this week, telling her to “either exercise [her] duties as a public servant and a Catholic, or have the honesty to formally renounce them.”
The harsh words came after Pelosi blasted a reporter for asking the “moral difference” between a late-term abortion and the murder of a viable baby after birth. Pelosi responded, not by answering the question, but by accusing the reporter of having an “agenda” and not being sincerely interested in an answer.
“Public servants are supposed to be able to tell the difference between serving the public and killing the public. Apparently, you can't,” National Director Fr. Frank Pavone wrote.
The last straw for Priests for Life seemed to be Pelosi’s comment during a June 13 press briefing: "As a practicing and respectful Catholic, this is sacred ground to me when we talk about this. I don't think it should have anything to do with politics."
With this statement, you make a mockery of the Catholic faith and of the tens of millions of Americans who consider themselves "practicing and respectful Catholics" and who find the killing of children -- whether inside or outside the womb -- reprehensible.
You speak here of Catholic faith as if it is supposed to hide us from reality instead of lead us to face reality, as if it is supposed to confuse basic moral truths instead of clarify them, and as if it is supposed to help us escape the hard moral questions of life rather than help us confront them.
Whatever Catholic faith you claim to respect and practice, it is not the faith that the Catholic Church teaches. And I speak for countless Catholics when I say that it's time for you to stop speaking as if it were.
Abortion is not sacred ground; it is sacrilegious ground. To imagine God giving the slightest approval to an act that dismembers a child he created is offensive to both faith and reason.
And to say that a question about the difference between a legal medical procedure and murder should not "have anything to do with politics" reveals a profound failure to understand your own political responsibilities, which start with the duty to secure the God-given right to life of every citizen.
Pelosi is not the first Catholic politician to receive criticism from the church for supporting abortion rights, however.
Church leaders have denied or threatened to deny communion to pro-abortion politicians, although the California Democrat said that’s never happened to her: “Fortunately for me, communion has not been withheld and I’m a regular communicant so that would be a severe blow to me if that were the case.”
Pelosi and Vice President Biden were heavily criticized for receiving communion at the mass to celebrate newly-elected Pope Francis. “To receive Christ while rejecting the unborn is a slap in the face to both,” Pavone told Life News.