The highly politicized response by the World Health Organization (WHO) to Covid-19 did much to discredit itself, but its latest move is even worse. It recently issued the “Abortion Care Guideline,” a document that attacks religious liberty and flouts international law.
To read Bill Donohue’s letter to WHO, click here.
Contact Craig Lissner, the key WHO official: srhhrp@who.int
Catholic League Forum is a weekly Q&A discussion between Catholic League president Bill Donohue and director of communications Mike McDonald on contemporary issues of interest to the Catholic community. This week’s episode discusses an affirmative action hypocrite in the U.S. government, the slandering of Polish Americans, and Citi’s policy of funding abortions for women. What’s going on in the private schools is also addressed. To watch click here.
Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on Citigroup’s pro-abortion policy:
Abortion is a contentious subject, one that doesn’t need to be further polarized, and certainly not by the business community. It doesn’t make any difference if a corporation wants to dive into this on the pro-life side or the pro-abortion side—it is none of their business. Yet some members of the ruling class can’t resist doing so. Not surprisingly, they are on the pro-abortion side.
After some states recently passed restrictive abortion laws, most notably in Texas, Citigroup (Citi for short) decided to finance abortions for women seeking to abort their child out-of-state. It told its shareholders this month, who will meet April 26, what the new policy entails. “In response to changes in reproductive healthcare laws in certain states in the U.S., beginning in 2022 we provide travel benefits to facilitate access to adequate resources.”
To be specific, Citi has agreed to pay the airfare and hotel expenses for women seeking an abortion; it can be done at any time of gestation and for any reason whatsoever. It did not say whether it would pay for their restaurant bills or their take-out orders.
Citi is a multinational investment bank that has a fiduciary obligation to its shareholders. This new abortion policy obviously violates that trust: investors buy stocks so they can maximize their returns, not to subsidize the political preferences of the corporate elite.
What if the woman contemplating an abortion were to change her mind at the last minute? Does she have to reimburse Citi for the expenses she incurred? Will Citi leave her stranded out-of-state if she balks?
The time has come for Citi employees who oppose this policy to sabotage it. Here’s the game plan.
Citi already pays the medical bills for men and women who think they can “transition” to the other sex. The time has come for one of the male employees in Texas—Citi has 8,500 employees in the Lone Star State—to claim he is pregnant and wants to abort his child out-of-state. If Citi won’t pick up the tab, he should sue for discrimination.
The madness of transgenderism continues to mount. That it is being underwritten by the ruling class makes it all the more invidious.
Contact Citi’s CEO: jane.fraser@citi.com
Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on Polish American reaction to a wholly unjust portrayal of Poles during the Holocaust:
Over 200 leaders of Polish American organizations have signed a letter to members of Congress asking that a book which offers a vile depiction of Poles during the Holocaust be discontinued in the schools.
The letter has been distributed to members of the House Committee on Education and Labor, Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education. It follows a decision by a Tennessee school district to drop the book from its curriculum.
The best-selling graphic novel, MAUS, by Art Spiegelman, which is targeted at children, features illustrations that are outrageous and needlessly offensive. But it is the lies, and the vicious insults hurled at Poles, that merit the most serious condemnation.
The letter by the Polish American coalition, led by Edward Wojciech Jeśman, president of the Polish American Strategic Initiative, lists several reasons why Maus does not belong as an assigned or recommended book in the schools.
Removing books from a school’s curriculum should never be taken lightly, but when the book in question (a) maligns an entire ethnic group (b) is historically indefensible and (c) is aimed at innocent, unsuspecting children, then to make it available in the schools is nothing short of educational malpractice.
Those who defend assigning MAUS would not assign a book which characterized blacks as pit bulls or American Indians as piranhas, never mind distort their historical heritage by depicting them as savages.
Many thanks to Ronald Rychlak, Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Mississippi, for bringing this issue to my attention. He is a member of the Catholic League’s board of advisors. I would also like to note that one of the signatories, Richard Walawender, serves on our board of directors.
Rep. Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan is the key committee member. Contact his chief of staff: bob.schwalbach@mail.house.gov
Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on how child and parental rights are being violated by an educational association:
Three weeks ago today, I sent a letter to Donna Orem, president of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), asking her to validate a story about the organization that was published by Breitbart, an internet media outlet; copies were sent to members of the board of trustees. She has not replied, thus I am going public with my concerns.
NAIS is the national accreditation association for private schools across the country. In my letter I refer to its “queer-inclusive curriculum,” one which constitutes manipulative and highly objectionable fare. Moreover, it does so in secrecy, intentionally shielding parents from its contents. Many Catholic parents who send their children to a private non-sectarian school would be horrified to learn what the curriculum entails, as would non-Catholic parents.
At a NAIS conference in 2020, a staff member explained to teachers in a training session what children will be taught.
“Starting in Pre-K we talk about their bodies, the parts that they were born with, about penises and vaginas and whether they make somebody a boy or a girl. But also their feelings, what do they feel like inside, do they feel like a boy or a girl? What does their head say? Do their heart and their body match up?” Vocabulary lessons include words such as “the vulva and the labia.”
After leading these children to question their status as a boy or a girl, the schools will then proceed to encourage those who are in rebellion against their nature. “Students ready to socially transition may initiate a process to change their name, pronoun, attire, and access to preferred activities and facilities,” the latter meaning locker rooms and bathrooms.
Books that students can access in their library may include Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe. It includes illustrations of boys performing oral sex.
All of this is to be done behind the back of parents. Worse, their children may be expelled from school if parents voice “strong disagreement” with the curriculum. To top things off, teachers are being instructed how to deal with “puritan” parents who object. The condescending attitude is typical of educational elites.
“Puritan Speak” includes phrases such as “That’s my job.” “They’re just not ready.” “They’re too young to know that.” “Won’t they lose their innocence?” “But, what if my child is not ready?” “You’re just trying to put ideas in their heads.” There is nothing “puritan” about these concerns—they are merely expressions of responsible parents.
What these educators are doing to children is child abuse. What they are doing to parents is parental abuse. This is not sex education: it is sexual engineering, and it is violative of the rights of mothers and fathers.
If there is one good thing that the pandemic yielded, it is the extent to which unsuspecting parents have learned just how morally debased some teachers and administrators have become. The pushback must continue.
Contact Donna Orem: orem@nais.org
Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on proponents of affirmative action:
When I was a professor, I told my colleagues how phony they were in supporting affirmative action. None of them were in favor of it when they had a friend or lover who was interested in a faculty opening—it was only when they didn’t have someone to plug that they played the game. They didn’t disagree.
Nothing has changed since, only today we have the specter of high-ranking white men insisting that more women and minorities be hired. It becomes even more hypocritical when this pitch is made on the eve of their retirement.
The latest phony is David Ferriero, Archivist of the United States. On March 14, he urged the Biden administration not to hire a white guy to replace him. “That’s advice I’ve given to the White House already: that you better not hire another white male…We’ve had ten white males.”
Ferriero will retire in mid-April. If he had any integrity he would never have taken the job in 2009. He knew then that all the previous U.S. National Archivists were white guys, so he should have dropped out in favor of someone who did not share his anatomy or race.
He had another chance to quit on January 13, 2022, the day he announced his retirement. But he didn’t. To make amends, he should now declare that he will not take a dime from his pension fund, and should instead redistribute his earnings to those women and minorities whom he deliberately passed over for employment. There are quite a few of them.
Dannielle Blumenthal worked at the National Archives for several years while Ferriero was the head honcho. She claims the workplace is “a very structurally racist place (her emphasis).” She ridicules him for his latest virtue-signaling scheme, namely his decision to launch The Archivists’ Task Force on Racism. The “Report to the Archivist,” released April 20, 2021, is chock-a-block full of all the right code words, “diversity” and “inclusion.” Truth to tell, it amounts to nothing but a hill of beans.
As to be expected, the report begins by paying homage to George Floyd, the ex-con drug addict who died following an altercation with a Minneapolis cop after resisting arrest. Then it gets serious, noting a “preponderance” of blacks and other minorities in “lower-status jobs.” It also notes “the preponderance of White people in higher-paying, higher-status jobs.”
This kind of systemic racism happened on Ferriero’s watch, and indeed he must bear at least some of the blame for it. Why didn’t he do anything about it? According to Blumenthal, under Ferriero, “racism was built in to the leadership structure. Everyone (or most people) in power were Caucasian.”
Ferriero is hardly a freak. We recently published an analysis of ten major corporations, ranging from Goldman Sachs to Walmart, assessing their commitment to diversity and comparing it to their actual track record of hiring minorities. All ten have a lousy history of making good on their much-vaunted interest in hiring blacks, Hispanics and Asians. The ruling class is a white boys’ paradise.
When I taught sociology at La Roche College in Pittsburgh (now a university), a left-wing professor of English, who was recently hired, cornered me in the parking lot on a Friday afternoon. He said one of his students was making the case against affirmative action, prompting him to ask if she had been taking my classes. Sure enough she was.
He smiled, self-assuredly, and walked away. I stopped him. “You have a moral obligation to resign immediately,” I said. But why, he asked. “Because you took a job from a black person,” I responded. His retort was priceless. “I thought I got the job because I was the best person who applied.” To which I said, “That’s my position—not yours.”
The problem with liberals is that they are quick to offer an ethical checklist for others, but always find a way not to apply it to themselves. For example, they love to write about climate change while preparing a speech aboard their private jet. They love to give talks about gun control while their armed bodyguards stand nearby. They love to condemn the construction of a wall on our southern border while living securely in their gated community.
The David Ferrieros of this world pat themselves on the back for establishing blue-ribbon committees on racial equality, and then doing nothing about it. They hope no one notices. We do. Now you do as well.
Contact: david.ferriero@nara.gov
In this special episode, Bill and Mike give a salute to St. Patrick and his role in spreading the Gospel in Ireland. They also discuss the relevant topics the League covered this week including a New Jersey congressman who is against parental rights and the increase of self-absorption in secular society. To watch click here.
In the course of a few days, two of the most prominent Catholic churches in the nation were desecrated by pro-abortion fanatics. They chose the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., and St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City, to vandalize. The occasion was the run-up to the anniversary of Roe v. Wade.
On January 20, on the eve of the March for Life in D.C., there was a prayer vigil at the Basilica. An anti-Catholic group, Catholics for Choice, was responsible for what happened.
Led by lesbian activist Jamie Manson, this outfit managed to project pro-abortion slogans on the Basilica. “We have to talk back to the anti-choice movement in religious language,” she said.
Bill Donohue responded, “In other words, her idea of religious language is to disseminate pro-abortion messages at a Catholic pro-life event. That would be like using racist language at a pro-racial justice rally.”
On January 22, another anti-Catholic outfit, New York City for Abortion Rights, projected “God Loves Abortion” and other vile slogans on the exterior of St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Supporters of the group shouted obscenities at pro-life Catholics entering and exiting the Cathedral.
Both of these shell groups are on the losing side of the abortion issue. Over the past few decades, more and more Americans having been moving in a pro-life direction, and the pro-abortion activists know it. They also know that the Supreme Court may overturn Roe v. Wade in June.
There have been a few legal challenges to light projection protests, but so far no court has ruled in favor of them. They are not seen as trespassing or in violation of nuisance statutes, nor have they resulted in economic harm. Therefore, they are seen as protected speech.
The media have a professional obligation to cover events like these ones, but they failed.
In a larger story on the March for Life, the New York Times and the Washington Post made mention of the desecration of the Basilica, but neither covered the assault on St. Patrick’s Cathedral. None of the other newspapers covered anything about either event, and all the TV broadcast networks and cable news channels were equally silent.
Had a Jewish synagogue or a Muslim mosque been targeted in this fashion, it’s a sure bet the media would have been all over these stories. But given their pro-abortion politics, and their hostility to Catholicism, it’s not surprising what happened.
We were the only lay Catholic organization in the country to register a protest. We enlisted our email subscribers to let their voice be known, and they did not hold back.
We have crossed swords with the National Football League (NFL) before, mostly for hosting anti-Catholic entertainers during the Super Bowl and for criticizing religious liberty legislation in the states. This year’s Super Bowl brought out the worst in the NFL.
Commissioner Roger Goodell said two years ago, “We at the National Football League condemn racism and the systematic oppression of black people.”
To that end, he approved such things this season as the singing of the black national anthem before games, end zone inscriptions that read “End Racism,” and a host of anti-racist messages printed on the players’ apparel.
What about the behavior of the players? After all, it is widely known that the “N” word is commonly used by black football players. In 2014, the NFL said that it would penalize players for using it. Moreover, Section 3 of the current NFL Rulebook prohibits using such language.
This sure looks like a PR stunt after what happened at the Super Bowl.
For example, why did the NFL showcase foul-mouthed singers—who specialize in using the “N” word—during the Super Bowl’s halftime festivities?
Three of the five musical celebrities who were featured at the Super Bowl, Dr. Dre, Kendrick Lamar and Snoop Dogg, have a long history of dropping the “N” word and using obscenities.
The message to young people is that it is okay to use filthy language and drop the “N” word. The NFL is a disgrace.
William A. Donohue
Sometime in the spring of 2021, I was asked by a distinguished movie production company from the U.K. if I was interested in being interviewed for a documentary they were planning to do on Mother Teresa. I agreed, albeit with reservation.
I agreed because I was honored to be chosen as her number-one defender. I did so with reservation because it begged the question: Why would they want me, unless, of course, the film was going to be a hit job on Mother Teresa? Was I not being used to “balance” the documentary. After all, if the film were a positive portrayal of her, there is no end to the number of persons they could have contacted.
In the end, I knew that if I took a pass, they would simply find someone else. That didn’t sit too well with me—I believe I can defend Mother Teresa better than anyone. Indeed, it was the sole reason I wrote my 2016 book, Unmasking Mother Teresa’s Critics (Sophia Institute Press). The timing was deliberate: Mother Teresa was to be canonized on September 4, 2016, and I wanted to get out in front of her critics who might seek to exploit the occasion.
The documentary on Mother Teresa is scheduled to open this March in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany and Italy; it may open in the U.S. this spring, but in what format I do not know. Minnow Films, along with Sky Group Limited, both out of London, are bringing it to the big screen.
When I signed an agreement to do a series of interviews in July, 2021, the film was called, “Mother Teresa: For the Love of God.” The period at the end of the title has now been changed to a question mark. That’s not a coincidence: it was done to suggest that maybe she had an ulterior motive. Hence, the need to bring me in to defend her.
How will the movie flush out? From what I have learned, the script offers both positive and negative accounts, with a nod to the latter. It is a three-hour series. I have yet to see it, though that will change shortly.
The interview I agreed to do was expected to last a day or two. Surprisingly, it turned out to be more like a week. The young men who did the shooting were extraordinarily cordial—even fun to work with—and very professional. Ditto for the young woman from England whom I conversed with about the project.
What is so controversial about Mother Teresa that she needs a defense? As I pointed out in my book on this saintly woman, her critics are mostly cranks, dabbling in conjecture and innuendo more than substance. Others are manifestly dishonest.
As recently explained to me, the first part deals with her childhood and her time in Calcutta. It explores the wide audience that she garnered, culminating in a Nobel Peace Prize. The next part covers her life in the 1980s. The third part examines her “dark night of the soul,” a period of time when she did not feel God’s presence and her dealings with a rogue financier is cited.
Evidently, I am featured quite often in the documentary. I certainly was given a lot of time to explain my position, and to vigorously rebut the many cruel myths voiced by her critics.
Mother Teresa’s most prominent, and unfair, critic was undoubtedly the late Christopher Hitchens. A video of our storied 2000 debate at the Union League Club in New York City is available online.
Why does anyone hate Mother Teresa? The reasons are varied, but much of what drives her critics is jealously, pure jealousy. They are jealous that a diminutive nun was loved the world over for her selfless giving to the dispossessed. What’s wrong with that?
Many of her most strident critics were both atheists and socialists (e.g., Hitchens). Her holy status does not sit well with atheists; her ability to serve the poor undermines the goal of socialists.
How so? Everything she did for the needy, the sick and the dying was voluntary, and she inspired countless others to follow in her footsteps. Socialists want the state to mandate programs for the poor, and do not look kindly on religiously motivated initiatives that work better than government welfare policies.
There is one other reason why she is despised. Her critics claim she did not try to conquer poverty. Guilty as charged. Her goal was to comfort the sick and dying in their waning years, not restructure society. Atheists and socialists cannot relate to that. That’s their problem. It also shows how shallow they are—they need not have any skin in the game when government distributes goodies to the poor.
How ironic it is that the socialist ideas advocated by her critics have done more to promote poverty than any other policy prescription. More perverse, it was left to people like Mother Teresa to attend to their victims.
I am so happy I was given the opportunity to defend her—again!