Pro-Life Leader Calls on Notre Dame To Cancel Obama Commencement Address

Posted by League Staff (March 20, 2009 at 3:56 pm)

For Immediate Release
Contact: Joseph Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League, 773-777-2900

Chicago, Ill.—Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League and its national director are calling on Notre Dame University President, Rev. John Jenkins, to withdraw his invitation to Barack Obama to deliver a commencement address there on May 17.

“Over the first two months of his administration, Barack Obama has established himself as the most pro-abortion president in U.S. history,” said League National Director Joe Scheidler, himself a graduate of Notre Dame, a Catholic university. “My alma mater should not be providing a platform for this president.”

“Starting from his first week in office, President Obama has enacted a string of executive orders, appointments and policy decisions that contradict Catholic teaching on the sanctity of life—a teaching that Notre Dame is supposed to uphold,” said Scheidler.

Among the pro-abortion actions Obama has taken in just two months in office, Scheidler lists:

• Overturning of the Mexico City Policy, which had prohibited U.S. funds from being used to promote or provide abortions overseas
• Working to overturn conscience protections for healthcare workers, forcing them to cooperate in abortion or risk losing their jobs
• Appointing pro-abortion Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, who has close ties to late-term abortionist George Tiller, to head the Department of Health and Human Services
• Dedicating federal funds to harvest embryonic stem cells for research at the expense of the most defenseless members of the human family

Scheidler is calling on concerned Catholics, especially Notre Dame alumni, to contact Jenkins and urge him to withdraw the Obama invitation.

If Notre Dame does not disinvite Obama, Scheidler says, the Notre Dame campus can expect a massive pro-life protest on graduation day.

“Father Jenkins cannot expect pro-life Catholics to stand back and allow the most pro-abortion president in U.S. history to make a mockery of Notre Dame’s Catholic identity,” Scheidler said.

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