Abortion - Pro Life - Pro-Life Priest Ejected From Catholic School Ceremony

NATIONAL CATHOLIC REGISTER

April 15 - 21, 2001

Pro-Life Priest Ejected From Catholic School Ceremony

NEWARK, N.J. - Father Peter West, an associate of Father Frank Pavone and a staff member at Priests for Life headquarters in New York, was recently physically pushed out of a Catholic school hall while a pro-abortion politician was being honored inside, Lifesite News reported.

Father West and a group of 15 pro-lifers protested the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Newark on Sunday, March 18. Their complaint was that pro-abortion politician Jim McGreevey was appointed Grand Marshal of the parade.

Wearing stickers reading, "McGreevey Supports Partial-Birth Abortion" and "St. Patrick Is Pro-Life," Father West entered a post-parade gathering at St. Patrick's School and gave McGreevey a copy of the American Bishops document "Living the Gospel of Life: A Challenge to American Catholics," which McGreevey said he would read.

However, after the discussion, Father West was approached by a woman who shouted at him saying, "How many children did you raise?" A debate ensued with several Catholic pro-abortion McGreevey supporters. Some denied that McGreevey supported partial-birth abortion, but Father West produced a newspaper article with a record of McGreevey's vote on the subject.

Father West said that a man in plain clothes, who identified himself as a police officer, accused him of harassment. Then he and a companion were physically pushed out the door nearly causing them to fall down a flight of stairs. However, after strenuously pointing out the irony that a Catholic priest had been ejected from a Catholic school by abortion supporters as a pro-abortion politician was being honored inside, the pro-lifers were allowed back into the school.

Father West told Lifesite News "I believe our first mission is to the Church, and trying to convince our own people that we cannot have any compromise on this issue."