HUNTERDON COUNTY, New Jersey (LifeSiteNews) – Catholic pro-life high school student Nichole Pagano was attacked while holding a pro-life sign at a pro-abortion protest on campus, leaving her with scratches on her arm and legs and a hurt shoulder.
According to Catholic News Agency, New Jersey Hunterdon Central Regional High School was harshly criticized after student Pagano was attacked while at the May 16 rally.
“You’ve got to just do what your heart says and what you believe in. You’ve got to do what’s right,” 16-year-old Nichole told CNA. “Even if it’s sometimes hard to do, you go to do it to make a stand and make a point.”
Nichole felt called to stand up for the unborn after she and her sister, Vanessa, saw about 200 students gathering on campus for an unsanctioned protest. Accordingly, she approached the crowd carrying a sign reading, “Equal Rights For Babies in the Womb.”
Nichole recounted that “there’s like 200 kids there and then all of a sudden they come surrounding us — mostly trying to come at me and attack me because I had the sign — and then they came at me all up in my face, verbally screaming at me, and physically even grabbed me and ripped me down,” she said.
RELATED: Abp. Cordileone says ‘aggressive’ push to expand abortion is part of a ‘spiritual battle’
Seven students have been suspended from Hunterdon Central Regional High School in New Jersey after a rowdy pro-abortion protest by students resulted in the physical and verbal assault of a sophomore holding a pro-life sign.https://t.co/Y4zlwDfO2c
— EWTN Pro-Life Weekly (@EWTNProLife) May 28, 2022
Following this, Nichole had scratches on her arm and legs and what her father described as a “sore shoulder.”
Following the protest, seven students were suspended and another seven were given “extended detentions.” School superintendent Jeffrey Moore held a live-streamed school board meeting on May 23 to discuss the protest.
“I want to reiterate, certainly the most distressing moments of this incident were in the behavior that was shown to counter-protesters who had arrived and those involved,” Moore said.
“Shoving, expletive-laden verbal aggression, vandalism to signs, signs were knocked over, thrown, kicked, all of those things that made this a most distressing and disrespectful scene and example of student behavior against a student there who showed up with another viewpoint.”
Moore claimed that some school and town police officers were “near that student so that she would have that presence nearby as we continue to work to dissipate the crowd.”
A member of the crowd immediately responded to this saying, “That’s a lie.”
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According to Nichole, both school principal Edward Brandt and Moore publicly apologized to her.
“It didn’t seem like too big of an apology, though,” Nichole said, referring to Brandt’s apology. “It kind of seemed like a quick, short, little apology. It didn’t seem very long and even that concerning.
At the meeting, New Jersey state assemblyman Erik Peterson harshly criticized the school’s response to the situation, saying Nichole “is the victim, not the ‘counter-protester.’ She was assaulted. It’s on video.”
“The problem, from my perspective, is the leadership,” he added. “These kids didn’t learn this on their own, they learned it here. And it starts with this board and the superintendent.”
The school was asked if they followed up on Nichole to ensure her future safety. A spokesperson launched into a lengthily description of their response while failing to answer the question.
San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone has told Nancy Pelosi, a pro-abortion Democrat, not to present herself for Holy Communion.
The archbishop is doing this to not only protect our Lord from sacrilege, but also to call Nancy Pelosi to repent from the grave sin of promoting abortion and from the sacrilegious communions that follow.
Archbishop Cordileone will now encounter sustained pressure to roll-back his decision, so we must stand with him today.
SIGN and SHARE this petition to stand with Archbishop Corileone as protects our Lord and Nancy Pelosi from further sacrilegious communions.
The Eucharist is the literal body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus Christ and no Catholic who has committed a mortal sin is to receive Holy Communion until confessing that sin in the Sacrament of Confession.
Nancy Pelosi's soul is in grave danger, not least because of sacrilegious communions as she continues a career-long crusade in support of killing unborn babies, and so the archbishop has done the most charitable thing possible in calling her to repentance and barring her from Holy Communion until she repents.
We must stand with this brave shepherd today, whom the people of San Francisco are lucky to call their archbishop.
SIGN the petition to support Archbishop Cordileone's brave defense of Our Lord in the Eucharist.
Pelosi said in March that that abortion “isn’t about what is your religious belief” and that “this really gets me burned up, in case you didn’t notice, because, again, I’m very Catholic – devout, practicing, all of that. They would like to throw me out, but I’m not going,” she joked, “because I don’t want to make their day."
What she doesn't understand is that her soul is at risk because of her support for spilling the innocent blood of unborn babies.
In a letter last month to Pelosi, Archbishop Cordileone made clear that “should you [Pelosi] not [publicly] repudiate your advocacy for abortion ‘rights’ or else refrain from referring to your Catholic faith in public and receiving Holy Communion, I would have no choice but to make a declaration, in keeping with canon 915, that you are not to be admitted to Holy Communion.”
In announcing that the Speaker of the House is barred from Holy Communion, Cordileone made clear that he "will continue to offer up prayer and fasting for you [Pelosi].”
This is the heart of a true shepherd - Cordileone is a father willing to undergo all manner of insults and ridicule from the media and lukewarm Catholics in order to call one of his flock back to the fold.
SIGN the petition today to stand with Archbishop Cordileone as he faces into a storm of criticism.
MORE INFORMATION:
BREAKING: San Francisco archbishop bars Nancy Pelosi from Holy Communion
Pelosi: ‘Of course’ companies should pay employees to travel out of state for abortions
Bishop of pro-abortion Nancy Pelosi launches public campaign of ‘prayer and fasting’ for her
House Democrats vote to codify Roe v. Wade, legalize abortion on demand
Pelosi defends ‘pro-abortion Catholic’ stance, claims pro-lifers ‘don’t believe in governance’
**Photo: PatristicNectarFilms/YouTube**
Nichole revealed that after the public apology, she “didn’t hear anything from anyone.” Likewise, she said, and her father confirmed, that the school failed to contact her parents.
This past month, news of the potential outlawing of abortion in parts of the U.S. has sparked violence against pro-lifers and pro-life organizations across America, which is apparently spreading to schools.