In late October, the Catholic League joined over 60 national organizations in signing a coalition letter addressed to every U.S. Senator requesting an immediate suspension of federal funding  for Planned Parenthood. At issue are allegations that the pro-abortion giant has violated federal and/or state laws on late-term abortions. Here is an excerpt of the letter:

“According to the 107-count complaint filed in Kansas’ Johnson County District Court last week, Planned Parenthood purposefully performed illegal late-term abortions in violation of Kansas State law and unlawfully falsified documents in order to conceal that fact. They are also accused of failing to comply with the required medical reporting guidelines.

“The complaint alleges 29 misdemeanor counts of performing ‘unlawful late-term abortions,’ 29 misdemeanor counts of ‘unlawful failure to determine viability for late-term abortions,’ 23 felony counts of ‘making false information,’ and 27 misdemeanor counts of ‘unlawful failure to maintain records.’

“Planned Parenthood operates around 860 facilities around the country, and there are approximately 40 states with laws banning late-term abortions. This illegal conduct may be happening all over the country.

“While Planned Parenthood claims that it does not perform late-term abortions after 22 weeks, the charges were reviewed by a Johnson County, Kansas district judge who found probable cause. These are substantive charges levied against Planned Parenthood. States have passed laws on late-term abortions because they are detrimental to women as well as babies. Women are often not informed that late-term abortions increase the likelihood of severe blood loss, damage to vital organs, later premature births and loss of fertility.

“We urge you to ensure that our tax dollars are not subsidizing abortion clinics that perform illegal late-term abortions.”

Please contact your senators about this important issue. Planned Parenthood has been getting away with deception and propaganda for decades. Now it appears it is also guilty of violating the law. It’s time it paid a price for doing so.

Beginning October 20, the Associated Press (AP) ran a three-day series on sexual abuse in the public schools. In its first installment on this issue, the AP called sexual abuse by public school teachers “a widespread problem.” The news wire service, which spent seven months gathering information, pulled no punches: “Students in America’s schools are groped. They’re raped. They’re pursued, seduced and think they’re in love. An Associated Press investigation found more than 2,500 cases over five years in which educators were punished for actions from bizarre to sadistic.”

Indeed, the AP said that on any given school day, three educators are actively hitting on students, thus speaking to “a much larger problem in a system that is stacked against victims.” And as we’ve known for some time, this is because the teachers unions are more interested in the rights of accused teachers than they are the welfare of alleged victims. Who speaks for the kids is a mystery.

Complicating the cause of justice was the National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification. It keeps tabs on guilty teachers but only shares the names among state agencies. No wonder suspended teachers are commonly passed from one school district to another, or from one state to another. So frequent is this phenomenon that it’s called “passing the trash” or the “mobile molester.”

Just as outrageous was the media’s reaction. A Nexis search showed that only five newspapers carried the entire three-day series: Daily Breeze (CA), Richmond Times Dispatch (VA), Knoxville News-Sentinel (TN), Statesman Journal (OR) and Inside Bay Area (CA); it was also carried by Connecticut Post Online.

So where was the Boston Globe, which broke the Catholic scandal, and all the other big media outlets? Just goes to show that it was never the molested who counted, just the identity of the molester.

When asked by the New York Daily News on October 30 about pop star Britney Spears’ latest photo shoot, which depicted racy scenes with a priest in the confessional (below), Catholic League president Bill Donohue had this to say: “This is all the puzzle pieces coming together. This girl is crashing. She’s not even allowed to bring up her own kids because she’s not responsible enough. Now we see she can’t even entertain.”

On CNN’s “Showbiz Tonight” on October 30, Bill Donohue maintained that Spears was not the anti-Catholic bigot that Madonna is, but added, “I think the girl is going south both in terms of her career and in terms of her personal life. She does need to see a priest. I mean a real one, get her head straight.” When music consultant Quddus Philippe suggested that the public might enjoy and support the kind of controversy that Spears’ photo shoot had generated, Donohue replied, “I wonder if the audience would support her if she chose Muslims instead of Catholics. I wonder how far she would want to push that envelope.”

Two national Catholic organizations, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and the Society of Catholic Social Scientists, are working in a joint effort to petition Pope Benedict XVI to expedite the cause for the beatification of Pope Pius XII. The petition was written by Sister Margherita Marchione, author of numerous books on the pontiff.

It is our strongly held conviction that Pope Pius XII has been unfairly portrayed as someone who stood silent during the Holocaust. Indeed, we know of no world leader who did more to resist the Nazis and rescue Jews than this great man. To depict him otherwise is to slander him, and this is not something Catholics will ever accept.

Please sign the petition below, cut it out and mail it to the Catholic League. You can also sign the petition by clicking here.