Posted on 09/30/2025 5:13:45 PM PDT by ebb tide
Pope Leo XIV responded to controversy over the Chicago cardinal’s plans to honor a Catholic U.S. senator who supports legalized abortion, saying that the senator’s record should be considered in its totality and that Americans should search together for the truth on ethical issues.
Several U.S. bishops condemned Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich’s plans to honor U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Illinois, with a “lifetime achievement award” for his work surrounding immigration policy despite his pro-abortion voting record.
“I am not terribly familiar with the particular case. I think it’s important to look at the overall work that a senator has done during, if I’m not mistaken, in 40 years of service in the United States Senate,” the Pope told reporters on Tuesday in response to a question from EWTN News.
He said: “I understand the difficulty and the tensions. But I think as I myself have spoken in the past, it’s important to look at many issues that are related to the teachings of the Church.”
“Someone who says I’m against abortion but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” the pope explained. “Someone who says I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”
“So they are very complex issues and I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them,” he continued, “but I would ask first and foremost that they would have respect for one another and that we search together both as human beings and in that case as American citizens and citizens of the state of Illinois, as well as Catholics, to say that we need to be close to all of these ethical issues.
(Excerpt) Read more at ncregister.com ...
Seem like both Cupich and Pope Leo are disciples of Bernadin's "seamless garment" heresy. There must be something in Chicago's water supply that all three have drunk.
Seven current bishops have joined Springfield, Illinois, Bishop Thomas Paprocki in calling on Cardinal Cupich to reconsider honoring Durbin, including Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco; Bishop James Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska; Bishop James Wall of Gallup, New Mexico; Bishop David Ricken of Green Bay, Wisconsin; Bishop Carl Kemme of Wichita, Kansas; Bishop James Johnston of St. Joseph-Kansas City, Missouri; and Bishop Michael Olson of Fort Worth, Texas.
The recently retired Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, also addressed the controversy over the weekend in a statement released to the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, in which he referred to the move by Cardinal Cupich as a “source of scandal.”
Looks like Pope Leo is siding with his Chicago frankencardinal, Cupcake Cupich, over the more orthodox U.S. Catholic bishops listed above.
This is really, really disappointing. I had held out out that the new guy would be better than Bergoglio, but he pulled off the mask here. But here comes the lousy bastard mouthing the far left “Catholic” line that relativizes and excuses legal abortion and absolves the Democrats for supporting it. Disgusting. To hell with him.
To me there is a difference and I’m Catholic, a baby is the most vulnerable and innocent in our society.
He’s still “young in office,” He needs to separate himself from the petty political squabbles and debates in the land of his birth.
Rather he should be TEACHING the catechism and admonish the faithful that reject the teachings. You cannot claim to be Catholic and endorse abortions. The Right to LIFE is the First Right, all others pale in comparison. I think he’s nothing in the world but a “kinder, gentler” Jorge Bergoglio.
Equivocator pope. What a putz. I’m supposed to listen to this clown give both sides of the argument and then say “meh”?
40 years in the Senate? If that isn’t an indictment that someone is a bad person, I don’t know what is.
According to the seamless garment, however, if one is for open borders, but is in favor of abortion, he is acceptably pro-life, and if # 1 opposes the death penalty, but is pro-abortion, he is acceptably pro-life.
He's not that young in office; he's been a bishop now for ten years.
Very disappointing. I am so sick of people weaseling out of this debate by using the ridiculous comparison of abortion and the death penalty. There is no comparison to an innocent unborn child and a convicted murderer. There is also no comparison when looking at the frequency of each. In the US in 2024, 25 people were executed the entire year. More children are aborted than that in half an hour.
I would also argue that the death penalty actually IS pro-life. Take a person who has committed murder and is in prison for life…what does he have to lose? What prevents him from killing his cell mate? A guard? Anyone inside the place he doesn’t like? How do you protect the lives of those inside the prison when all of the prisoners know that they never have to fear execution?
Excellent post, and I might have to borrow this excerpt as my new tagline:
“In the US in 2024, 25 people were executed the entire year. More children are aborted than that in half an hour.”
Thank you and please do. I really want more people to wake up to this ridiculous abortion/death penalty comparison.
Yep, that is pretty much how the demonic modernist math works out.
So slippery, and unfortunately, that kind of sophistry actually fools a lot of pew-sitting Catholics, mostly donkey party adherents or dopey independents, who aren’t paying enough attention to what the Catholic faith actually is (or, in their diocese, should be but isn’t).
The Cardinals should have elected his brother.We’re screwed, this guy is a flaming lib, especially at a time when young people are returning to CHRIST. He supports baby killers, open borders, (except at the Vatican) murderers not getting the death penalty.
The decision to honor pro-abortion U.S. Senator Dick Durbin seems to be having a negative impact on the daily life of dissident Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich.
It’s quite simple: There are tens of thousands of people of people who are aborted for every one person who is executed. And the Council of Trent declared infallibly that the death penalty can be (and often is) just.
The pope is a heretic; he’s Satan’s bitch, and he will be one of the last souls to get out of Hell, and I say that with no fear of sinning. Even though I believe the death penalty is rarely justified in the U.S., to compare the two is absurd and diabolical.
Jorge was slower in ripping the boots off his cloven hooves.
Okay, Leo has officially jumped the shark. The “seamless garment” heresy was rejected by JPII and is a distortion of the prolife issue.
“Someone who says I’m against abortion but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” the pope explained.
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Abortion is murder. The death penalty is not murder, it’s justice.
Durbin is a dishonorable man. Pope Leo is a disappointment.
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