Fr. Pavone thanks National Right to Life for Pro-life Honor!

Priests for Life is happy to announce that its national director, Fr. Frank Pavone, will receive the 2001 Proudly Pro-Life Award from the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC).

The Proudly Pro-life Award is perhaps the most prestigious pro-life honor given in the United States. Past recipients include Mother Teresa, President Ronald Reagan, John Cardinal O'Connor, and Pope John Paul II. The award will be officially presented at a banquet at the famous Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City on April 25, 2001. Invited guests include the highest leaders in the Church (including officials from the Vatican), government and pro-life movement.

Wanda Franz, Ph.D, President of NRLC, said today: "We are delighted that Fr. Frank Pavone has agreed to accept the Proudly Pro-life Award for 2001. His national and international, outspoken, public advocacy on behalf of life, has drawn attention to the sacredness of each human life, and our responsibility to protect and nurture each God-given life, from conception to natural death. He has been a tireless worker in defense of life and has helped to move our country toward becoming a culture of life."

Fr. Pavone said in response: "I receive this award with gratitude, but also with a great sense of restlessness, because our goal is not yet achieved. Priests for Life worked closely with National Right to Life in the 2000 election season, urging voters nationwide to elect candidates who will advance the Culture of Life. The people at National, along with all of us at Priests for Life, long for the day when every life, without exception, is welcomed and protected. We will continue to work toward this goal in close collaboration with all the organizations of the pro-life movement, and all people of good will--- no matter what their race, religion, or political affiliation."

Fr. Pavone became National Director of Priests for Life in 1993, with the permission of John Cardinal O'Connor of New York. In this full time position, he has traveled to all of the 50 states and to five continents to fight abortion. He has spoken in India at the personal invitation of Mother Teresa, and to the pro-life caucus of the US House of Representatives. Norma McCorvey, the "Jane Roe" of the Supreme Court’s abortion decision Roe vs. Wade, called Fr. Pavone "the catalyst that brought me into the Catholic Church." In 1997 he was asked by the Vatican to help co-ordinate pro-life activities throughout the world as an official of the Pontifical Council for the Family; and, in 1999, the Daily Catholic named him in the top third of the Top 100 Catholics of the Century.

For more information on how to obtain tickets for the Proudly Pro-life Banquet, please call (202) 626-8813, or (202) 626-8827. To arrange an interview with Fr. Pavone, please call Jerry Horn at (540) 729-1122.