The Immaculate Misconception of Pro-Choice Catholics

“1 in 4 Abortion Patients is Catholic,” read a well-planned professionally executed projection of an evil statistic onto the tower of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. A pro-abortion “group” calling themselves “Catholics for Choice” proudly took responsibility for it. This spectacular act of transient vandalism was accomplished on the eve of the March for Life event in D.C. while a Prayer Vigil for Life was being observed inside the Basilica for the conversion of pro-choicers.

The March for Life is the largest rally in defense of the unborn that happens annually in Washington, D.C. with local rallies in other U.S. cities. The mammoth pro-life event is also known to be overlooked by the mainstream media who underplay the numbers if not totally ignore the rally of such size. No doubt that the pro-abortion messages beamed on the sacred walls of the Basilica got the attention they desired as they were orchestrated on the night before the March.

Choiceless By Choice

Perhaps Jamie L. Manson, head of Catholics for Choice, columnist with the leftist National Catholic Reporter, provoked better attention with her antics at the Basilica than she has with her writing. Her public statements highlight the growing insecurity among pro-abortionists with the possibility of Roe v. Wade soon being overturned by the Supreme Court.

In the United States, the abortion rights are heavily entangled with several other issues. The degree of the mess may be noted from the words of Manson, a Catholic identifying as a lesbian:

Obstructions to abortion can disproportionately impact the poor, people of color, LGBTQ people, people who are already vulnerable or in states of profound powerlessness.” […] “They’re going to suffer more — the poor will get poorer; the sick will get sicker.

What worries me is when a Catholic thinks and speaks with such hopelessness. Where is the Christian joy? What does salvation mean to you? Which part of the Body of Christ are you? Does this Body have a Head? What part of the human body does anything that the brain has not commanded?

Each of us is called to serve the dignity of every human person, for all are made in the image and likeness of God, the Imago Dei. Each human person has equal opportunity to all common goods. Although each person that “Catholics for Choice” stands for has a God-given dignity, abortion is not “a good” from God or at all.

Cloudy Catholic Journalism

The writings of two journalists from Jesuit-run America magazine (randomly picked from news results) offer a sad commentary on the state of Catholic journalism. It is not a matter of “So what?!” Many Catholics still look up “Catholic” on the internet to make their faith and morals decisions. Are they receiving the Truth that the Church teaches or just opinion-based “facts”?

While J. D. Long-Garcia calls the Catholics for Choice’s light projection a “shocking” “stunt” and a “sacrilege,” a few observations from his article illustrate my point:

First, Long-Garcia calls Catholics for Choice’s messages “arresting” and “shocking” because that is how sacrilege is. Since he does not elaborate what he thinks the “sacrilege” is about, we may safely conclude he is referring to the violation of the sacred space that is the Basilica.

Further, he writes, “No doubt, most Catholics who see this will be offended, whatever their stance on abortion.” Does this mean that the majority of Catholics view a sacred space as undeserving of the treatment it received from those self-proclaimed Catholics?

Earlier in his article, he shared as his “new pet peeve” the irony of pro-choice messages being projected on the Basilica celebrating the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. He seems to get the point about Mary being the “Vessel of Honor” as is one of her titles in the Litany of Loreto. But he does not go as far as to refer to her (womb) as the sacred space where the Christ Child was conceived.

He then gets off the “sacrilege” train and focuses his attention on the “prank” being “childish and rude.” To me, this seems even belittling of Manson’s angry zeal. His concern instead is that the prank “undercuts their own cause by potentially alienating pro-choice Catholics who see this stunt for what it is.” 

It appears that this Catholic journalist—and I only cite him for what he writes—goes all in for neither the Immaculate Conception nor the scandalous Catholic outfit. Here is an example (emphasis mine):

“The stunt gives a terrible image of pro-choice Catholics. On their website, Catholics for Choice claims to “honor what is best in the Catholic tradition.” Well, this isn’t it. If we are all Catholics, whatever our political leanings, can we at least agree that churches are sacred places? Using a church as a mere backdrop on which to project messages violates a fundamental trust we must maintain in one another.

What is the ideal image of “pro-choice Catholic?” It may sound like an oxymoron to a Catholic who fully accepts the entirety of Catholic teaching without ifs, ands, or buts. Catholic does not remain catholic if one takes only “the best” of what is Catholic. The “fundamental trust we must maintain in one another” smells like a social contract that eliminates God. What a chasm.

Catholic at a Remove?

Long-Garcia’s confrere Michael J. O’Loughlin, on the other hand, leaves out the alleged Catholic identity of the miscreant pro-abortion group at least in the title of his report: ‘Group projects pro-choice messages on national basilica, the latest targeting of Catholic worship spaces over abortion.’ It sounds as though the perpetrators of the offensive act had nothing to do with the Catholic Church.

Is a Catholic correspondent expected to be so at such a remove on account of their profession? Or are they simply “not Catholic” in their mindset? Catholic reporting of every stripe is placing opinion over obedience, often sidestepping conscience formation as per Church teachings in their work in the process, both for oneself and for the reader.

Good Shepherd or Weathervane?

Wilton Cardinal Gregory, the Archbishop of Washington, D.C. issued a press release that is quoteworthy on the malicious act (emphasis mine):

The true voice of the Church was only to be found within The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception last evening.

There, people prayed and offered the Eucharist asking God to restore a true reverence for all human life. Those whose antics projected words on the outside of the church building demonstrated by those pranks that they really are external to the Church, and they did so at night.

A faithful Catholic would find comfort in the Cardinal’s words. He affirms that the voice of the pro-lifers inside the Church is in consonance with the voice of the Church. When he refers to “reverence for all human life” in conjunction with the Holy Eucharist, he teaches the inevitable nexus between life issues and the Holy Eucharist.

In pointing out that the laser beam vandals “really are external to the Church,” he is providing an image of those who stand with the Church versus those who stand against it. I dare say, he is alluding to an ipso facto excommunication.

This is heartening coming from the Cardinal Archbishop (in whose seat the targeted Basilica is), since the last time he made bad news was by declaring he would not deny Holy Communion to the pro-abortion President Joe Biden.

Will Cardinal Gregory faithfully lead his flock to the Way of Christ hereon or would he subvert Truth to pander to human respect? Was this just one of his “pastoral” ways (“pastoral” being euphemism for taking the convenient route or a plain refusal to speak the Truth the Church teaches) that merely happens to be a faithful stance? Kyrie Eleison!

A Useful Lesson for Church Leaders

At what point did we come to accept being pro-choice (pro-abortion) as one of the ways of being Catholic? When did the Church become a space for fighting for pseudo rights that have no basis in natural law?

The vandal “Catholics for Choice” provide a useful lesson, and Cardinal Gregory’s quote above has all the clues.

If the Church does not proclaim the Truth loud and clear, evil consequently becomes loud and clear. Any desecration of the level that these so-called Choice Catholics unleashed can most effectively be combatted only by due reverence to the Holy Eucharist and faithfulness to the perennial fundamental teachings of the Church on Faith and Morals. If the level of reverence in every parish Mass can be bettered in some manner, that is where the solution lies. Otherwise, we are Catholics in name only (CINO as they now call it).

How are we individual Catholics better than “Catholics for Choice”? By merely not being among the ones to cause this desecration? What about Catholics who privately support abortion (“I would never undergo abortion, but I acknowledge the right of someone who needs one.”)

What about those Catholics (including Bishops, priests, and parish employees) who although claiming to be “for life,” did not do enough to live it, teach it, preach it, or question the flagrant irreverence and the indifference to the Real Presence? Are these not as guilty of this desecration of Christ’s Body?

Any change begins at the local parish and can follow only a personal change of heart. If we cannot see the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist, neither can we see the real presence of life in the womb.

Instead, what if, in response to the 2019 Pew Research survey that reported that two thirds of Catholics do not believe in the Real Presence, the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception or even the typical American parish had a projection on the church wall that read:

“Only 1 in 3 Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist. Are you one of them?!”

Pray for Unity, Not Democracy

During this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (January 18-25, 2022), culminating on the Feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul the Apostle, the Cardinal’s words can be taken as a fitting reminder that the Church is not a democracy where majority rules but a unity in one body, one spirit, a call to one hope of our call under the one Lord, one faith, and one baptism, all under one God Who is Father of all, as the Apostle Paul exhorts (Cf. Ephesians 4:4-6).

The faithful are free to criticize each other in public discourse, as well as disagree with leaders in the Church, but their goals cannot supersede what the Church has taught from the very beginning. This does not mean an artificial absence of conflict or forbiddance of personal opinion.

In the process of achieving authentic Christian unity there is enough room for love, pastorality, listening, accompanying, and even dialoguing. These, however, must not be used as methods of arbitration of doctrinal disputes but as tools to achieve the unity that Christ desired when He prayed:

“And I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth. I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.” (John 17:19-21).