Bill Donohue

Besides an insatiable appetite for control, what defines the Left is an equally insatiable appetite for envy. No one epitomizes these vices today better than New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a young Muslim man born to privilege who has never had a real job.

He recently stuck his face into a camera and said, “When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich. Well, today we’re taxing the rich.” He had his proverbial snarky grin on his face, delighted with his decision to fleece the upper class. If he had any integrity, he would include himself and his parents in his rape-the-rich game.

Mamdani has made it plain that he supports the “abolition of private property.” Or as he likes to put it, “If there was any system that could guarantee each person housing—whether you call it the abolition of private property or you call it a statewide housing guarantee—it is preferable to what is going on right now.”

Calls for the “abolition of private property” are what made Karl Marx famous. It is a basic tenet of communism. Now if Mamdani were honest, he would have to rid himself of his private property holdings, and those of his uber-rich parents. They all sing from the same communist playbook, but in real life they are capitalists par excellence.

Mamdani loves private property so much that he owns four acres of land in Jinja, Uganda. It is worth an estimated $250,000. Not bad for a plot of land with nothing on it (at least for the moment). As one Ugandan told a reporter, “One thing for sure is that Zohran owns not only one land here, but many.” He may not be required to report private property holdings that do not generate income, so he can skirt scrutiny. This is the kind of capitalist trick that if done by others would drive him mad.

The working class can barely afford to pay for one wedding, but Mamdani had no problem paying for three of them. The biggest one was in Uganda. He made sure to keep the riff-raff far away. He hired heavily armed men and masked special forces to guard his family’s estate, making ICE agents look angelic.

Mommy and daddy are filthy rich. Mira Nair is an international filmmaker and Mahmood Mamdani is a Columbia University professor. He makes $300,000 a year, which is not exactly chump change, especially for a Marxist. She is worth an estimated $5 million. She sold her Manhattan apartment in 2019 for $1.45 million.

Family holdings in Uganda are extensive, going beyond Jinja. Their prize possession is a luxury 5-bedroom villa on two acres of land. It has a pool, gardens and a spectacular view of Lake Victoria. It is worth more than 1 million dollars.

Despite all his loot, Mamdani wants to rape the rich. He is not driven by justice—he is driven by envy. Envy is not identical to jealousy. The jealous want what others have; the envious want to deprive others of what they have. That defines Mamdani.

The Catholic Church considers envy to be one of the seven capital sins. Robert Nisbet, the great American sociologist, got it right when he said, “Of the seven deadly sins, of all states of the human mind indeed, envy is the basest and ugliest. It is also the most corrosive of spiritual and moral fiber in the bearer and the most destructive of the social fabric.”

It is bad enough that Mamdani stokes the flames of envy, but what makes him even more detestable is his rank hypocrisy. Pope Francis did not know him, but he knew of his ilk. “Hypocrites are people who pretend, flatter and deceive because they live with a mask over their faces and do not have the courage to face the truth.”

Mamdani doesn’t have the courage to tell the truth about his enormous wealth. Instead, he pretends to be one of the masses. But he never was and he never will be. He is a nepo-baby foreign investor who is not subject to the consequences of his own economic policies. “Do as I say, not as I do” never sounded more obscene.

Bill Donohue

Sharia is the law that is derived from Islamic texts and traditions. Whether it is more of a friend or foe of liberty is disputed, but both sides can’t be right.

On March 20, the New York Times ran an editorial taking aim at President Trump’s “Islamophobia.” Without assessing its merits, what interests the Catholic League is whether its interpretation of Sharia is correct. It defines it as “a set of principles, based on the Quran, that guide life for Muslims, much as biblical precepts guide Christians and Jews.” “Extreme versions” exist, it allows, “including Afghanistan and Iran.”

Agreeing with the Times is the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Muslim civil rights organization.

Sharia, it says, “plays the same role in Islam that canon law plays for Catholics and halacha plays for Jews, a voluntary moral compass, not an alternative legal code.” It goes on to say that “Like other faith communities in the US and elsewhere, we see no inherent conflict between normative values of Islam and the US Constitution and Bill of Rights.”

A week prior to the Times editorial, Rep. Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House, expressed his concern about those who “come to a country and not assimilate but to impose Sharia law.” The problem there, he notes, is that “Sharia law is in conflict with the Constitution.”

Agreeing with Johnson is the European Court of Human Rights.

In 2003, the Grand Chamber ruled that “It is difficult to declare one’s respect for democracy and human rights while at the same time supporting a regime based on sharia, which clearly diverges from Convention values…” Similarly, according to Islamic scholar Robert Spencer, Sharia law is “contrary to America’s founding principles and may violate federal law and the Constitution.”

Islamic texts may not settle the issue, but they do not seem to support the position taken by the Times and CAIR.

The Quran (5:44) declares that failing to “judge by what Allah has revealed” makes one a disbeliever. This would appear to render the U.S. Constitution subordinate to Sharia. Furthermore, the Traveller, a classic Islamic manual of Islamic law, notes that “Jihad is a communal obligation.” At best, this affirms the need for a militaristic struggle; at worst it is a call to arms.

Leaving aside the scholarly debate, what matters in the end is how Sharia is interpreted by those who implement it.

Freedom House annually reports on the state of freedom worldwide, rating every country as Free, Partly Free, or Not Free. Almost all the countries with a Christian majority are rated Free or Partly Free, and all but one with a Muslim majority (Senegal) are rated Not Free or Partly Free. That says it all.

It is undeniably true that the more fully Sharia is implemented, the greater the threat to civil liberties. In other words, in its purist form, Sharia is wholly incompatible with the tenets of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But Christianity is not.

The three nations which have full Sharia implementation are Iran, Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. They enforce Sharia as the sole or primary source of all law, including Islamic text legal punishments (amputation, flogging, stoning) and capital penalties for apostasy, blasphemy, adultery, and theft.

Islamic Republic of Iran

Freedom House:

Iran’s constitution requires all laws to conform to Twelver Shia (Ja’fari) Sharia. Islamic text legal punishments are authorized and regularly applied. Iran’s constitution recognizes only Zoroastrians, Jews, and “Christians by birth” (Armenians, Assyrians, etc.) as protected minorities with limited rights. All others, plus converts, are treated as threats to the Islamic state. Apostasy and blasphemy are punishable by death.

• Iran holds regular elections, but they are not free or fair. The unelected Guardian Council vets and disqualifies candidates, and real power lies with the Supreme Leader and unelected institutions that control the security forces, judiciary, and economy. Media are heavily censored, journalists are arrested or killed, and independent. The judiciary is not independent and serves as a tool of repression: arbitrary arrests, torture, unfair trials, and executions are common.

Afghanistan

Freedom House:

• Since overthrowing the elected republican government in August 2021, the Taliban has ruled Afghanistan as an Islamic Emirate with Sharia as the sole legal framework. The Taliban leader exercises unlimited authority by decree, with no constitution in place. Islamic text legal punishments are enforced nationwide. No non-Islamic public worship is permitted, and apostasy carries a death sentence. Women are almost entirely excluded from public life, including education and employment.
• All political parties and opposition groups are banned. There are no elections, no representative bodies, and no independent media.

The conclusion is obvious: Sharia is the enemy of liberty. We enjoy our freedoms precisely because of our Judeo-Christian heritage.

Bill Donohue

Racism is a curse, and it is therefore understandable that news stories about the corrupt Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) are focused on its funding of the Ku Klux Klan. What is frequently overlooked is its record of targeting Christians, especially Catholics.

Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, nailed it when he said SPLC was guilty of “manufacturing racism to justify its existence.” That’s akin to firefighters setting fire to a row of houses so they can put it out, and then demanding an increase in salary and benefits. SPLC has also invented anti-Catholicism to serve its political agenda.

Eleven charges have been brought against SPLC by a federal grand jury, including six counts of wire fraud, four counts of bank fraud and one count of money laundering. It paid at least $3 million to eight individuals, including those linked to the Klan and neo-Nazi groups. While there is no evidence that it paid anti-Catholics, it is undeniably true that it worked to promote anti-Catholicism.

SPLC has long attacked those who stand for traditional moral values. It has a “hate map” on its website that details those groups it labels as “hate groups.” Besides naming a handful of small wacky right-wing groups, it includes reputable conservative organizations such as Alliance Defending Freedom, Family Research Council and Moms for Liberty. None of these are hate-mongers. The real hate-mongers are those like SPLC who smear responsible entities.

Guess who SPLC denies are “hate groups”? Antifa and Black Lives Matter. Antifa is a loosely knit bunch of urban terrorists, and Black Lives Matter is a racist bunch of thugs. But not to SPLC. “Designating Antifa as Domestic Terrorist Organization Is Dangerous,” and “Black Lives Matter Is Not a Hate Group.” The violence these two groups have engaged in is well documented. By contrast, the conservative organizations it cites as “hate groups” have never threatened, harmed or killed anyone.

SPLC does not list the Catholic League as a “hate group,” per se, but it has several listings of us. To take one example, we defended President Trump’s banning of trans persons from the military. It was horrified when I said, “Kudos to Trump for banning men and women who switch their genitals from the military. The armed forces are not a lab for sexual engineers.”

It is telling that it blames me for promoting hatred because I have objected to publicly funded artistic displays that show large ants crawling all over Jesus on the Cross. I am the problem for objecting, not the bigots who defile Christ. And so on.

It also got bent out of shape when I commented on an animal shelter that resisted a dog owner’s request that his pet be euthanized because the owner thought the animal was homosexual. To which I said, “Being gay is not only a bonus for humans these days, it is a definite plus for dogs as well.” Normal people laugh; abnormal people go berserk.

On a more serious note, SPLC has a history of objecting to bigots who hate Jews and blacks, but it has nothing to say when learning that the same person is also anti-Catholic. That does not offend them.

The granddaddy of them all is when it advised the Biden Justice Department how to sabotage Catholicism.

The FBI, under Biden, conducted a spy operation on traditional Catholics. It did not monitor dissident Catholics who are pro-abortion. No, it only went after those who were—in its own words—“pro life,” “pro-family,” and who “support the biological basis for sex and gender distinction.” They were literally called “domestic terrorists.”

Guess who the Biden FBI leaned on for advice? SPLC. To be sure, there were some FBI agents who warned against using SPLC as a reliable source, but they were overruled. The FBI-SPLC connection was aimed at spying on traditional Catholics so they could smear their reputation and thereby undermine their efforts. Just as SPLC “manufactured racism to justify its existence,” it manufactured anti-Catholicism to justify its existence.

A more despicable organization would be hard to find. It was morally bankrupt from the beginning.

SPLC was founded by Morris Dees. He was fired in 2019. According to the Los Angeles Times, some two dozen employees sent a letter to the board of directors before the news broke of Dees’ firing. They said that “internal ‘allegations of mistreatment, sexual harassment, gender discrimination, and racism threaten the moral authority of this organization and our integrity along with it.’”

Perversely, Dees championed himself as the enemy of white supremacy, yet his own people said he was a racist. But now we know he was not alone in hating blacks. To wit: SPLC likes to grease the Klan.

Similarly, Dees was not the only one responsible for eviscerating the integrity of SPLC. He had nothing to do with declaring war on Catholics. That was left to his successors.

SPLC is positive proof that “The fish stinks from the head down.” Lock ‘em up!

Rhode Island is the latest state to demonstrate its selective interest in combating the sexual abuse of minors. It is only interested in probing the Catholic clergy, having zero interest in probing the clergy in every other religion. Furthermore, it has no interest in investigating the on-going crisis in the public schools.

When blacks are subjected to disproportionate stops by the police, it is called racial profiling. What Rhode Island is doing to priests is religious profiling. Yet the media are silent about this egregious injustice. They wouldn’t be silent if the Attorney General, Peter Neronha, investigated sexual harassment on the job, selecting only reporters to probe.

Neronha’s report, released on March 4, covers cases of alleged abuse dating back to 1950. It found that 75 accused members of the clergy (66 of whom were priests) were responsible for victimizing 300 minors.

Guess what else Neronha found? What every other investigation has found: 83 percent of the victims were male, and 74 percent of them were postpubescent. This means that homosexuals did most of the damage. Get it straight: When adult males have sex with postpubescent males, it’s called homosexuality, not pedophilia. But don’t expect Neronha or the media to report on this fact. The cover-up continues.

When did this happen? As always, it was during the sexual revolution. It was in the 1960s and 1970s when the lion’s share of the offenses took place.

The last time there was a known instance of the sexual abuse of minors by the Catholic clergy in Rhode Island was 15-years ago in 2011. When was the last time a minor was violated in their public schools? Last year, when a school bus monitor allegedly sexually abused three special needs students. One was in kindergarten.

Is Neronha going to tackle the public schools? He should. Major studies on Rhode Island’s public schools reveal that it is consistently ranked among the worst in the nation in dealing with the sexual abuse of minors.

The AG’s report reads as though the sexual abuse scandal is ongoing in the Catholic Church and that Neronha’s office did yeoman work in uncovering it. Wrong on both counts. We are talking about old cases where the bad guys are either dead or have been kicked out of ministry. Not one of the 75 members of the clergy mentioned in the report is in active ministry. Moreover, it was the Diocese of Providence that did most of the data gathering, without which Neronha could not have issued his report.

We blanketed the Rhode Island media and lawmakers about this injustice. We also contacted approximately 140 parishes in the state.

University of Notre Dame icon Lou Holtz died on March 4 at the age of 89. He led the football team to an undefeated season in 1988, winning the national championship. But to those who knew him, he was also a model of what a Catholic gentleman should be.

Noted Notre Dame historian Fr. Bill Miscamble said Holtz “loved the Blessed Mother and, as he deemed it, her school. The football program was not ancillary to Notre Dame’s Catholic mission but integrated into it.”

He is right. Holtz told his players that “I firmly believe that Our Lady on the Dome will watch out for you. Spend some time at the Grotto, and you’ll discover that this school is special.”

EWTN and Fox News star Raymond Arroyo said the day after Holtz died that “He will not only be missed by his family and friends, but by colleagues, players, the communities and those of us touched by his friendship and leadership.”

Bill Donohue met Holtz at a speaking engagement that they both participated in and came away admiring his positive outlook and deep faith. “This was a man on a mission, and no one was going to stop him.”

Holtz spent eleven years at Notre Dame and energized those around him to persevere in the face of adversity and always put their faith in God. There are very few like him today, which is why his legacy needs to be treasured.

The University of Notre Dame is not only one of America’s best institutions of higher education, it is also seen, for the most part, as an authentically Catholic institution.

That is why it was so disconcerting to read that a professor, Susan Ostermann, was named director of the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies. She is not someone who happens to be “pro-choice”—she is a pro-abortion zealot.

Any person who falsely claims that the pro-life movement has “its roots in white supremacy and racism,” and condemns crisis pregnancy centers as “anti-abortion propaganda sites,” belongs working at Planned Parenthood, not Notre Dame. Planned Parenthood, of course, was founded by a bona fide white supremacist, Margaret Sanger.

Ostermann didn’t get the job by mistake. She got it with the approval of the president, Fr. Robert Dowd, provost John McGreevy and the dean of  the Keough School of Global Affairs, Mary Gallagher. Dowd claims he was “blindsided” by the appointment. That’s strange. Did he not know that his predecessor, Fr. John Jenkins, publicly rebuked Ostermann for championing the pro-abortion cause? Surely McGreevy and Gallagher must have known.

The good news is that the blowback was ferocious and ultimately forced Ostermann to go back to the classroom. Led by the brilliant historian, Fr. Bill Miscamble, and the courageous Bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Kevin Rhoades, the case was made to reject her appointment. Some twenty bishops, including Archbishop Paul Coakley, president of the bishops’ conference, joined the fight, as did many students and alumni; those who have been given awards at Notre Dame also registered their objections. So it ended well. But problems remain, and Notre Dame is not unique among Catholic schools.

I taught at a nominally Catholic college for 16 years, and witnessed firsthand how uncommitted many administrators and faculty are to the teachings of the Catholic Church. In fact, some were openly hostile to Catholicism, and this included the nun who ran the school. But La Roche College in Pittsburgh (now a university) is not atypical.

Georgetown University, a premier Catholic institution, has two pro-abortion student clubs on campus. Moreover, student government officials have sought to punish students who accept the Church’s teachings on marriage. It also employs a professor who justifies rape and slavery, provided the rapists and slavemasters are Muslim.

Thankfully, Notre Dame is not like Georgetown. But its central problem is still extant. There are two main reasons why a pro-abortion extremist came close to being promoted: one is ideological and the other is a matter of identity.

While it is oversimplified to say there are social justice Catholics and pro-life Catholics, there is more than a measure of truth to it. Catholic teachings on the poor, the needy, the rejected, and immigrants are seen as being in the liberal camp; those that stress abortion, euthanasia, marriage, the family and sexuality are seen as being in the conservative camp. Both are expressions of Catholicism.

It has become abundantly clear that social justice Catholics are soft on abortion. That’s being kind. Quite frankly, many of them—indeed most—do not regard abortion as “intrinsically evil,” which is the way the Church defines it. They see it as unfortunate. The Church also says racism is “intrinsically evil.” On that they agree. In short, racism upsets them infinitely more than abortion.

Are there Catholics in the conservative camp who are soft on racism? No doubt there are, but in my experience there are far fewer of them than there are liberal Catholics who are soft on abortion.

The other problem is not ideological; it is matter of identity. Unfortunately, many Catholic professors and administrators are uneasy being identified as Catholic in higher education circles. To be exact, they have a deep-seated need to win the affirmation of secular elites. At bottom, they are not comfortable in their Catholic skin.

They know the way secular elites look at Catholics of a more traditional stripe, and they are scared to death of being thrown in with them. In other words, their reluctance to defend conservative moral teachings—even when they don’t disagree with them—is done to win the blessings of secular elites, in and out of education. That’s how insecure they are about their Catholic identity.

Christian Smith, a Notre Dame sociologist, recently wrote an article in First Things explaining why he left the school. He says the Catholic identity problem is due to three things, one of which is a strong desire to secure “mainstream acceptance by ‘peer institutions’: Duke, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, Washington University in St. Louis, Emory, Rice, Stanford, NYU, and the like.” He says “Notre Dame desperately wants to belong to this club.” Regrettably, this leads many to low ball their Catholicism.

Notre Dame will be challenged again, and it will come from within. But as long as it has enough faculty, students and alumni who are vigilant—and there is no question about that—it will never lose its reputation as a truly great Catholic institution of higher learning.

Houses of worship need enhanced protection these days from anti-religious bigots. In recent times, virtually every major religion has had some of their houses of worship vandalized or invaded. Moreover, congregants have been subjected to taunts and threats. At stake is the First Amendment right to freely practice our religion.

While this is a nation-wide problem, it is a pressing concern to New Yorkers. Jews, in particular, have been targeted more than any religious group. What happened last November was despicable. Two hundred protesters showed up outside Manhattan’s Park East Synagogue holding vile anti-Jewish signs. They also yelled vicious comments at Jews going to synagogue, taunting them ferociously. This was totally unprovoked and totally indefensible.

Fortunately, the New York City Council elected a Speaker in January who is standing up against these bullies. Julie Menin is leading the fight against attacks on all houses of worship. Bill Donohue wrote to her expressing our support for her efforts, requesting we play an active role. She is being sent recent news releases we have written on this subject.

Included in this batch are statements Donohue has made about Mayor Zohran Mamdani. As you can see, his religious messaging is very troubling, and his penchant for hiring religious bigots is just as ominous. This does not bode well for the future, which is why the Catholic League supports Speaker Menin’s call for legislation that would provide greater protection for houses of worship.

The First Amendment means nothing unless it is enforced. That means that those who seek to undermine religious liberty must be defeated. The Catholic League is delighted to join the fight.

February 27, 2026

Hon. Julie Menin
New York City Council Speaker
City Hall
New York, NY 10007

Dear Speaker Menin:

The leadership you have shown in combating anti-religious bigotry is commendable. As president of the nation’s largest Catholic civil rights organization, headquartered in New York City, I have not only fought anti-Catholicism, I have fought anti-Semitism, joining forces with Jewish allies on many occasions for over three decades.

Accordingly, I would like you to add the Catholic League to the list of organizations that support your efforts to protect houses of worship from being bullied, harassed and otherwise threatened. Freedom of speech is precious, but when it is invoked to inhibit another First Amendment right, namely the free exercise of religion, it is indefensible.

In particular, the attack on the Park East Synagogue last November was despicable, and I said so in print, on radio and on TV. Yet some New York City notables, such as Zohran Mamdani (before and after he won the mayoral race), have made light of it.

It would help if you could put us in touch with those on your staff with whom we can work. Thank you for your defense of religious liberty.

Sincerely,

William A. Donohue, Ph.D.

President

P.S. See enclosures

The invasion of Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota rightly triggered a visceral response on the part of people across religious communities. These Nazi-like tactics have also taken place in Catholic churches and Jewish synagogues. If there is one Catholic church that is singled out for protest, it is St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.

Here is a list of some of the famous invasions. We are not counting incidences committed by mentally disturbed people.

“Stop the Church” AIDS/abortion protest (December 10, 1989):

• During a Sunday Mass celebrated by Cardinal John O’Connor, members of the militant homosexual activist group ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power), and the Women’s Health Action and Mobilization (WHAM!), infiltrated the cathedral as part of the “Stop the Church” demonstration. They disrupted the service by shouting slogans against the Church’s opposition to abortion and sex education policies in public schools. They laid down in aisles, chained themselves to pews, and desecrated a consecrated Eucharist. Cardinal O’Connor was forced to abandon his sermon. Dozens of protestors were inside the church, and over 4,500 protesters demonstrated outside; over 100 were arrested.

Radio stunt (Aug. 15, 2002):

• “Shock jocks” Opie and Anthony encouraged listeners to have sex in risky places, and two of them had sex during the day in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, on a holy day of obligation, in front of men, women and children. It was a staged event, arranged by the radio hosts: they had comedian Paul Mercurio inside the Cathedral so he could give a graphic description of the stunt on his cell phone. The Catholic League contacted the FCC and Viacom, the media giant that owned the host station. In due course, the radio show was cancelled and the “shock jocks” were fired.

Animal-rights activists (March 27, 2016):

• Six animal rights activists from the group Collectively Free interrupted the noon Easter Sunday Mass during a moment of silence. They stood up and chanted “Easter is a time for love! No more shedding animal blood!” to protest animal exploitation and the consumption of Easter ham. One of the protesters was arrested.

George Floyd Protests (May 30, 2020):

• During the Black Lives Matter protests, protesters spray-painted the F-word, “BLM,” “NYPDK” along with the phrase “no justice, no peace” on the facade of the Cathedral. One of the stairs was also spray-painted with George Floyd’s name. Two people were charged the following month for the crime.

New Year’s Protest (January 1, 2021):

• On New Year’s Day 2021, police officers responding to a protest on Fifth Avenue found the acronym “ACAB” tagged on the cathedral. Video from the scene shows protesters blocking two NYPD cruisers and banging on the hood of one, and shouting expletives at officers. No arrests were made.

Transgender Funeral (February 15, 2024):

• Cecilia Gentili was a man who falsely claimed to be a woman. He was also an illegal alien, a drug addict, a prostitute, a trans activist, and an atheist. At Gentili’s funeral service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, transgender activists dressed as hookers, disrupted the Mass by dancing in the aisles, sang “Ave Cecilia” when “Ave Maria” was sung, and shouted, “St. Cecilia, Mother of All Whores.” Cardinal Dolan ordered a Mass of Reparation be held as a response to this vile incident.

Gaza ceasefire protest (March 30, 2024):

• Three pro-Palestinian protesters affiliated with Extinction Rebellion interrupted the Easter Vigil Mass by standing front and center, unfurling a banner reading, “SILENCE = DEATH.” They shouted “Free Palestine” and demanded a ceasefire in Gaza. They were dragged out by security, and all three were arrested.

There have also been incredibly obscene incidents like the 1994 parade up Fifth Avenue marking the 25th Anniversary of the Stonewall riot. Men and women went naked in front of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, masturbated in the street, engaged in Satanic dances and extended their middle finger at the Cathedral.

Catholics who are angry about some issue do not act this way. But militant secularists have no respect for boundaries, do not believe in dialogue and are not averse to using violence to further their goals. They are a menace to society, and too many members of the ruling class refuse to condemn them.

It is true that we can never truly know what is in another person’s heart, but when a politician makes his religion a central aspect of his public persona, yet pursues policies that inherently contradict his faith, it raises serious questions. The following Democrats are clearly guilty of playing the religion card when it suits them.

Being Religious

Former President Joe Biden

“My religion defines who I am.” He added, “I’ve been a practicing Catholic my whole life. And it has particularly informed my social doctrine.”

Rep. Nancy Pelosi

“I’m a Catholic, a devout, practicing Catholic. I take great comfort in my faith, come from a very Catholic family, largely pro-life.”

NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani

“I am Muslim, and I refuse to apologize for this.” He added, “I will not change who I am….I will not change the faith that I am proud to belong to.”

Rep. Ilhan Omar

“I think my faith as a Muslim is very important.”

Catholic Church on Abortion

The Catechism of the Catholic Church clearly states: “Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable.”

Biden

He started out having mixed feelings about abortion, but in time he adopted the far-left position. As president, his administration used every available resource to promote abortion, even exploring novel ways to circumvent state laws restricting the barbaric practice.

Pelosi

She opposes laws that ban the killing of babies who are 80 percent born (partial birth abortion), and she has even won Planned Parenthood’s highest award. Her extreme position on abortion, along with other major departures from Catholic teachings, earned her a ban on receiving the Eucharist from San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone.

Islam on Abortion

In general, the Islamic view favors the sanctity of human life over abortion. Most Muslim scholars apply the Quran’s passages against the taking of innocent human life to the issue. This is true across many different schools of Muslim thought, and both Sunni and Shia Muslims generally disapprove of abortion.

Mamdani

He opposes any restrictions on abortion. That is why his voting record consistently receives a 100 percent score from Planned Parenthood.

Omar

She has been a co-sponsor of the Women’s Health Protection Act in the last three sessions of Congress. This legislation seeks to remove most restrictions on abortion and removes religious exemptions.

Catholic Church on LGBT Issues

The Catechism of the Catholic Church clearly states that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered,” and are contrary to the natural law. Further, the Catholic Church rejects transgenderism, which Pope Francis called “demonic.”

Biden

In 2016, as vice president, he officiated a “gay wedding.” As president, he championed transgender procedures for minors and rescinded conscience protections to force Catholic doctors to perform these procedures.

Pelosi

She has supported legislation that would redefine marriage and has even gone so far as to say that same-sex marriage is “consistent” with Catholic teaching. Additionally, she champions transgenderism, including gender “reassignment surgeries” for minors.

Islam on LGBT Issues

In Islam, same-sex relationships are considered taboo. In 34 Muslim-majority countries, homosexual activity is illegal, and none of the 47 Muslim-majority countries recognize “gay marriages.”

Mamdani

He is a huge advocate of the radical LGBT cause. He supports transgender rights across the board and disagrees with the Islamic belief that there are only two sexes. He regularly attends gay events, including parades. He wants the LGBT curriculum to be mandatory in all New York schools, making no allowance for private or parochial schools. Mamdani has also pledged that he will spend $65 million in taxpayer money for sex-reassignment surgery.

Omar

She supports men competing in women’s sports and is proud to march in the Twin Cities Pride Parades. She favors ending conversion therapy, calling it “a form of torture.” In 2023, as Muslim parents joined with their Christian and Jewish neighbors in Montgomery County, Maryland, to protest the school district’s decision to compel their children to participate in lessons which promoted LGBT themes. She co-sponsored a resolution condemning their response.

Biden, Pelosi, Mamdani and Omar like to wear their religion on their sleeves while working to undermine core religious teachings on marriage, the family and sexuality. The media should hold them accountable but too often they give them a pass.

The Catholic League supports the accommodation of religion, whether it be in public or private venues. But we find it bizarre, if not troubling, when venues not known to accommodate religious expression decide to do so by singling out one religion. This is what the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City has done. The religion it is singling out is Islam.

On the first floor, in Room 961 of the Robert Lehman Collection, in between paintings of the Virgin Mary with baby Jesus, there is a standup sign that reads as follows:

For the month
of Ramadan
we invite you
to use this space
for prayer and
reflection

All are welcome

We have a hard time imagining the Met welcoming Catholics. But if they did, we have a suggestion. Why not erect the following sign?For the 40 days
of Lent,
we invite you
to use this space
for prayer and
reflection

All are welcome

What makes the Muslim-only policy even more inexplicable is how out-of-character it is. While the Met has long featured religious iconography, it also has a reputation of promoting raunch.

In October 2023, the Great Hall of the Met displayed gay bondage and sado-masochistic imagery. It used obscenities, and slogans such as, “May you fill yourself with lust,” to describe what the New York Post said were “images of seemingly naked males with their genitals blurred out and men standing over other men who appear to be wearing dog collars.”

One woman who spotted this “artistic creation” said, “I saw a wasteland ‘Mad Max’ scenario with people dressed in S&M gear and others who looked as if they were fornicating with the earth.” She said a portrayal of women was so sick that “It looked Satanic and demonic to me.”

Leaving aside the Met’s fondness for gay sexual expression, why does it feel obliged to welcome Muslims during Ramadan but not Catholics during Lent? Is this its idea of multiculturalism? We have long known that this ideology has less to do with paying tribute to religious and ethnic groups outside our Judeo-Christian heritage than it does in devaluing it.

The Met’s elite must feel very good about themselves. Their goal, no doubt, is to showcase their commitment to inclusion and diversity. But bowing to Muslims, by excluding Catholics, shows how morally bankrupt their commitment really is.