News

Image

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 19, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi touted her Catholic faith in an interview with MSNBC that aired Thursday night, before going on to lambast Republican politicians for supporting abortion restrictions and opposing funding for contraception. 

“I’m Catholic. I go to church regularly. I had five children in six years,” Pelosi told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell in response to a question about the slew of pro-life legislation that has been passing in state legislatures. “This is women’s health. The reproductive part of us is part of our health, and especially young women.” 

“So how can they say, we’re not going to be doing contraception or we’re not going to be doing family planning?” she asked. “And so people focus on the most extreme cases in terms of terminating a pregnancy, but what is at risk is the discretion of a woman to make judgments about the size and timing of her family.” 

Pelosi made the remarks on the same day as Texas Governor Rick Perry signed into law the state’s late-term abortion ban, which pro-abortion activists have charged could close down as many as 37 of the state’s abortion clinics. They also come as dozens of lawsuits challenging the Obama administration’s HHS birth control mandate are wending their way through the court system around the country. 

“The reality is that people in our country do practice birth control and use contraception,” Pelosi told Mitchell. “I don't know if my colleagues need a lesson on the birds and the bees. I really don't get it.” 

She concluded, “This should not even be a political issue.” 

This is the second time in little over a month that Pelosi has addressed the issue of abortion. Both times, she made prominent mention of her Roman Catholic faith. 

In June, Pelosi responded to a question about late-term abortions, saying, “As a practicing and respectful Catholic, this is sacred ground to me when we talk about this.” 

Click “like” if you are PRO-LIFE!

Those remarks provoked a back and forth between Pelosi and Priests for Life National Director Fr. Frank Pavone, after Pavone wrote an open to the Minority Leader challenging her statement. 

“Mrs. Pelosi, for decades you have gotten away with betraying and misrepresenting the Catholic faith as well as the responsibilities of public office,” he wrote in that letter. “We have had enough of it. Either exercise your duties as a public servant and a Catholic, or have the honesty to formally renounce them.” 

In a subsequent interview with Think Progress, Pelosi shot back, saying that in that letter Fr. Pavone was being “hysterical.”

“The arrogance of it all! It’s like something ancient, medieval,” she said. She also said that, while she understands what the Catholic Church teaches on abortion, “my faith isn't about what their position is.”

Pelosi, despite being one of the most pro-abortion legislators in Congress, has repeatedly pointed to her Catholic faith at the same time as defending her abortion views, sometimes even suggesting that her faith is the reason she supports abortion. 

Pelosi told Newsweek's Eleanor Clift in 2010 that she had “some concerns” about the Catholic Church's positions on abortion and homosexuality.

“I am a practicing Catholic, although they're probably not too happy about that. But it is my faith,” said the former Speaker. “I practically mourn this difference of opinion because I feel what I was raised to believe is consistent with what I profess, and that is that we are all endowed with, a free will and a responsibility to answer for our actions. And that women should have that opportunity to exercise their free will.”

The Congresswoman has been publicly rebuked by numerous Catholic bishops over her position on moral issues.