On July 23, Catholic League president William Donohue testified before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House Committee on the Judiciary on a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Religious Freedom Amendment, which was first sponsored by Rep. Ernest Istook and then revised twice, once by Rep. Henry Hyde and again by Rep. Dick [...]
In an unusual move, the Pentagon sought to muzzle the free speech of Roman Catholics. The issue was whether Catholics in the Air Force, Army and Navy could participate in an appeal by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) to protest President Clinton’s veto of the bill banning partial-birth abortions. The NCCB asked Catholics to [...]
The Catholic League scored perhaps its biggest victory yet in pressuring the District Attorney from Lane County, Oregon into apologizing for authorizing the bugging of a priest in the confessional. District Attorney Doug Harcleroad issued his apology and a pledge never to do this again on May 22. The case began on April 22 when Father [...]
The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights is urging passage of a new bill sponsored by Congressman Jim Talent that would award scholarships to the parents of indigent children. The bill would allow parents to choose from a wide variety of schools, including private religious schools. Known as the Community Renewal Project Act of 1996, [...]
On May 6, Home Box Office aired Priestly Sins: Sex and the Catholic Church. The one hour special focused on the issue of sexual abuse in the priesthood. We were told that the problem is one of "epic" proportions and that the root cause is celibacy. The Catholic League issued the following news release on the film [...]
The New Republic, one of Washington’s favorite liberal weeklies, doesn’t like the Catholic League’s Annual Report on Anti-Catholicism. We thought you’d like to know what we had to say in reply, so here is the text of the letter we sent to the editor: "In your ‘Notebook’ editorial of April 22, you criticize the Catholic League for [...]
The Paramount movie, "Primal Fear," which opened nationwide on April 3, maligns the Catholic Church by presenting every Catholic character as being either a sexual abuser, victim of sexual abuse or swindler. The Archbishop of Chicago is portrayed as a priest who sexually abuses young boys, commands them to have sex with girls in pornographic movies, [...]
The Catholic League's second Annual Report on Anti-Catholicism was published in March. It details approximately 150 of the most egregious examples of anti-Catholicism that took place in 1995. The purpose of the report is to inform those in the media, education and government of the extent and variety of anti-Catholicism that is prevalent in American society [...]
On the cover of the March Playboy was a picture of a young woman dressed as a Catholic schoolgirl. The woman appeared undressed in the magazine in a section titled "The Stripper Next Door." William Donohue denounced this abuse on the NBC show Extra and issued the following statement to the press: "The cover of the March Playboy represents the crass sexual [...]
The Catholic League has asked the U.S. Department of Justice to undertake an investigation of the growing link between the Libyan government of Muammar Khadafy and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. Specifically, the league wants to know whether the Nation of Islam has violated U.S. law by accepting financial support from Libya, a nation certified [...]
