House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Catholic bishop issued a strong statement condemning her pro-abortion stance Thursday, saying the congresswoman is supporting “one of the most heinous evils imaginable.”
Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone of San Francisco responded to Pelosi after she slammed pro-life voters Monday for “being willing to sell the whole democracy down the river for that one issue,” abortion. Pelosi, a pro-abortion Democrat who represents San Francisco in Congress, said their votes caused her “great grief as a Catholic.”
In a statement Thursday, Cordileone said Pelosi does not speak for the Catholic Church, and her abortion advocacy contradicts one of its most fundamental teachings.
“Christians have always understood that the commandment, ‘Thou shall not kill,’ applies to all life, including life in the womb,” the archbishop said. “Around the end of the first century the Letter of Barnabas states: ‘You shall not slay the child by procuring abortion; nor, again, shall you destroy it after it is born.’”
Cordileone also quoted Pope Francis who, in 2019, said eliminating a human life in an abortion is never the answer to any problem.
He said Pelosi owes pro-life voters an apology. Noting President Joe Biden’s call for unity and healing, he said the congresswoman’s comments did the opposite.
“Speaker Pelosi has chosen this week to impugn the motives of millions of Catholics and others for choosing to make voting on the issue of abortion their priority and accuses them of ‘selling out democracy,’” he continued.
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While there are many important issues that Catholics must consider when they vote, the archbishop said no Catholic can support abortion in good conscience.
“‘Right to choose’ is a smokescreen for perpetuating an entire industry that profits from one of the most heinous evils imaginable,” Cordileone said. “Our land is soaked with the blood of the innocent, and it must stop.”
Abortion is considered a priority by many voters, not just Catholics, because it destroys more human lives than any other cause. Since 1973, more than 62 million unborn babies have been legally aborted in the U.S.
Cordileone praised the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for encouraging Catholics to make ending abortion a “preeminent priority.”
“… as Catholics, we will continue to speak out on behalf of those who have no voice to speak for themselves and reach out to, comfort and support those who are suffering the scars of the abortion experience,” he concluded. “We will do so, until our land is finally rid of this despicable evil.”
Earlier this week, Cordileone also thanked Archbishop Jose Gomez, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, for “stating clearly once again that opposing the injustice of abortion remains our ‘preeminent priority,’ while acknowledging that ‘preeminent’ does not mean ‘only,’” in his statement about Biden. Like Pelosi, Biden supports abortion on demand while professing to be a devout Catholic.
Pelosi says she is a devout Catholic, but many of her actions contradict her faith. Among other things, she wants to force taxpayers to pay for elective abortions and force nuns who serve the poor and elderly to cover contraception that may cause abortions in their employee health plans. Once, she even called her support for killing viable, late-term unborn babies in abortions “sacred ground.”
