SEATTLE, Washington, March 1, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Seattle University, a Jesuit Catholic college in Seattle, Washington, is offering its students the opportunity to intern at Planned Parenthood in order to fulfill the degree requirements for a Bachelor of Arts in Public Affairs.
According to the University’s website, public affairs majors are required to participate in an internship with a public or nonprofit organization. The website provides a list of 29 such organizations with whom public affairs students can intern, among them Planned Parenthood of Western Washington.
The University also boasts a Woman’s Studies Department, whose website encourages students to consider volunteering with women’s organizations such as the Feminist Majority Foundation, the National Organization for Women, and the University sponsored organization Seattle University Society of Feminists.
The pro-life organization TFP Student Action is urging pro-life supporters to sign a protest petition addressed to Seattle University President Fr. Stephen Sundborg, SJ.
The petition, which has collected 2,500 signatures within four hours of being posted on the organization’s website, urges Fr. Sundborg to remove Planned Parenthood and all other pro-abortion groups from the University’s website.
“I’d like to know who Seattle University wants to serve, Saint Ignatius and the truth or Margaret Sanger and the culture of death? You can’t do both at the same time,” commented TFP Student Action Director John Ritchie in an interview with LifeSiteNews. “When a Catholic university promotes abortion it betrays God and it betrays its own students. I’m praying that Seattle University stops encouraging students to seek internships at Planned Parenthood.”
To contact Fr. Sundborg directly:
Fr. Stephen V. Sundborg, SJ
Seattle University, President
901 12th Ave.
Seattle, WA 98122-1090
Phone: 206-296-1891
E-mail: [email protected]