:Catholics for Choice

CFC was founded in 1973 by Catholics Joan Harriman, Patricia Fogarty McQuillan, and Meta Mulcahy as Catholics for a Free Choice (CFFC), with the aim of promoting access to abortion in the context of Catholic tradition. It emerged from Catholics for the Elimination of All Restrictive Abortion & Contraceptive Laws, a New York lobby group that had been formed in 1970.{{Cite book |title=Women and Christianity |first=Pamela K. |last=Brubaker |chapter=Gender and Society: Competing Visions of Women's Agency, Equality, and Well-Being |publisher=ABC-CLIO |year=2010}}

An early member of the board of directors was Joseph O'Rourke, then a Jesuit priest. In August 1974, President Harriman asked O'Rourke to travel with her to Marlborough, Massachusetts, to baptize a baby whose local priests refused to perform the rite – Catholic canon law forbids priests from baptizing an infant, if they are not assured that at least one of the parents will raise the infant with the Catholic faith.{{cite journal|journal=Commonweal |title=Correspondence |last=Harriman |first=Joan |volume=101 |number=12 |date=January 1975 |url=http://kanda-db1.ggasoftware.com/Summary/Commonweal/V101I12P3-1.htm |quote=I will clarify some facts surrounding the Baptism in Marlboro, Mass. In the name of Catholics for a Free Choice, as president, I called Rev. Joseph O'Rourke who is on our board of directors and asked him to baptize the Morrealle baby. I placed the call Aug. 12 and he returned it Aug. 13th. On Aug. 16th I went to Boston for the press conference to announce that Rev. O'Rourke would perform the Baptism. I stated at the press conference that Father Keane was unacceptable to all since he had publicly condemned "Free Choice." CFFC supports "Free Choice" and protects Catholic laypersons and clergy from oppression by the hierarchy. There was a clear-cut issue of reproductive freedom that was made public before Catholics for a Free Choice was ever involved. The date for the baptism was set after the press conference; a prime consideration was that it be a time when relatives and friends of the Morrealle family would be able to attend. }}{{dead link|date=November 2016 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} The baby's mother, 20-year-old Carol Morreale, had been interviewed regarding an abortion clinic that was proposed for Marlboro by Bill Baird, an activist from New York City.{{cite magazine |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,943736,00.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081222064955/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,943736,00.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=December 22, 2008 |title=Religion: Sins of the Mother |magazine=Time |date=September 2, 1974 |access-date=August 30, 2011}} Morreale told a newspaper reporter that she did not advocate abortion herself but that she was in favor of "free choice" for others and thus she supported Baird's proposal. Because of her statement in the newspaper, and the town's polarization over the banning of abortion clinics, Morreale's local priest would not baptize her three-month-old son Nathaniel, and Humberto Sousa Medeiros, the Archbishop of Boston, said that he would not allow any other priest to perform the rite. On August 20, 1974, O'Rourke publicly baptized the baby on the steps of the Marlborough church, in front of its locked doors and 300 spectators.{{cite web |url=http://www.newspaperarchive.com/SiteMap/FreePdfPreview.aspx?img=103501760 |title=Priests Call Baptism 'Heresy' |work=Wisconsin State Journal |date=August 22, 1974 |access-date=August 30, 2011}} O'Rourke acted against his superiors' express orders. This was preceded "by a long trail of discontent, often testing the authority of the church", according to The New York Times News Service. O'Rourke was dismissed from the Jesuit Order in September.[https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1755&dat=19751018&id=qj41AAAAIBAJ&sjid=IGcEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6642,1131528 Priest Expelled for Forbidden Baptism] Sarasota Herald-Tribune, p. 4b, October 18, 1975[https://web.archive.org/web/20121105124836/http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-151974744.html "When the swallows come back to Capistrano"] Bottum, Joseph. First Things, October 1, 2006. at highbeam.com. Retrieved 2011-07-14.{{dead link|date=April 2016}} He served for a time as CFFC board president.

In 1978, Frances Kissling joined CFFC. Kissling had operated an abortion clinic and was a founder and director of the National Abortion Federation. In 1980, she became a member of CFFC's board of directors and in 1982 was made president, which position she held until her retirement in February 2007.Djupe, Paul A. and Laura R. Olson, [https://books.google.com/books?id=frt7RDOT1PUC&pg Encyclopedia of American religion and politics], p. 84, Infobase Publishing 2003[http://www.catholicsforchoice.org/news/inthenews/After25YearsaCatholicWarriorStepsAside.asp "After 25 Years, a Catholic Warrior Steps Aside"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110928184044/http://www.catholicsforchoice.org/news/inthenews/After25YearsaCatholicWarriorStepsAside.asp|date=September 28, 2011}} Burke, Daniel. Religion News Service. 2007-02-22. at CFC website. Retrieved 2011-07-14.[https://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/27/us/27choice.html The New York Times. Backing Abortion Rights While Keeping the Faith. Banerjee, Neela. February 27, 2007] Kissling lobbied politicians and activists, many Catholic, to work in favor of giving women access to contraception and abortion and pushed the CFFC to lead more political campaigns.

In 1979, Patricia McMahon became CFFC president and shifted CFFC's legal status from a lobby to an educational association, opening up the group to tax-exempt status and to foundation support.{{Cite book |first=Sarah |last=Slavin |title=U.S. women's interest groups: institutional profiles |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=It0XSBZz2wEC&pg=PA98 |pages=98–102 |publisher=Greenwood |year=1995|isbn=9780313250736 }} One result of this was a $75,000 grant on behalf of the pro-abortion rights Sunnen Foundation, which funded the group's first publications, the Abortion in Good Faith series.{{cite web |url=http://bcrw.barnard.edu/archive/religion/We_Are_the_Mainstream.pdf |page=20 |date=March 1981 |title=We Are the Mainstream: Dissent in the Catholic Church |work=Abortion in Good Faith |publisher=Catholics for a Free Choice |first=Jenefer |last=Ellingston}}

{{Main|A Catholic Statement on Pluralism and Abortion}}

In 1982, CFC sponsored a briefing of Catholic members of Congress, highlighting that the majority of American Catholics disagreed with the Catholic Church's position on the topic of abortion. Congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro wrote an introduction to the briefing, and endorsements were also received from Congressmen Tom Daschle and Leon Panetta. Ferraro wrote that responses varied to the problem of abortion, and that "the Catholic position on abortion is not monolithic...."{{cite book|first=Frances |last=Kissling |author-link=Frances Kissling |editor=Rosemary Skinner Keller |editor-link=Rosemary Skinner Keller |editor2=Rosemary Radford Ruether |editor2-link=Rosemary Radford Ruether |chapter=Women's Freedom and Reproductive Rights: The Core Fear of Patriarchy |title=Encyclopedia of women and religion in North America |volume=3|publisher=Indiana University Press |year=2006 |isbn=0-253-34688-6 |pages=1104–1106}}

During the 1984 presidential campaign, Ferraro was chosen as the vice-presidential running mate of Walter Mondale. Cardinal John Joseph O'Connor, Archbishop of New York, sharply criticized Ferraro's pro-abortion rights position, and in October 1984 Kissling responded to O'Connor by placing an advertisement signed by 97 Catholics, including theologians, lay persons, priests and nuns, in The New York Times. The advertisement, "A Catholic Statement on Pluralism and Abortion," stated that "direct abortion ... can sometimes be a moral choice" and that "responsible moral decisions can only be made in an atmosphere of freedom from fear of coercion."

The Catholic Church took disciplinary measures against some of the nuns who signed the statement, sparking controversy among American Catholics, and intra-Catholic conflict on the abortion issue remained news for at least two years.{{Cite book |first=Michele |last=Dillon |title=Catholic identity: balancing reason, faith, and power |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LOevknhl9i8C&pg=PA106 |page=106|publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1999|isbn=9780521639590 }} This ad, however, strengthened the recognition and credibility of the CFC within the Catholic community and American politics.{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kAJN-OcsZhAC&pg=PA146 |pages=146–147 |title=Sacred work: Planned Parenthood and its clergy alliances |last=Davis |first=Tom |publisher=Rutgers University Press |year=2005|isbn=0-8135-3493-3}}{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mwvqvYv7N5kC&pg=PA96 |page=96 |last=Weaver |first=Mary Jo|title=What's left?: liberal American Catholics |publisher=Indiana University Press |year=1999|isbn=0-253-21332-0}}

In 1992, CFC was classified as a non-governmental organization by the United Nations (U.N.); CFC subsequently participated in some U.N. conferences. With other groups, the CFC successfully lobbied against the naming of John M. Klink, a former representative of the Holy See at the U.N., to lead the State Department Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration in 2001. More recently, it has assisted in drafting legislation with the stated goal of reducing abortions, partly by increasing financing for family planning.

In April 1995, the National Catholic Reporter published a letter by Marjorie Rieley Maguire, a theology professor, former CFC activist and co-author of CFC's 1984 The New York Times advertisement, "A Catholic Statement on Pluralism and Abortion". In her letter, Maguire described CFC as "an anti-woman organization" devoted to "the promotion of abortion, the defense of every abortion decision as a good, moral choice and the related agenda of persuading society to cast off any moral constraints about sexual behavior." Maguire also charged that when she was involved with CFC, she "was never aware that any of its leaders attended Mass" and that "various conversations and experiences convinced [her] they did not."[http://www.ncregister.com/site/article/catholics_for_choice_is_neither/ D. DeMarco, "'Catholics for Choice' Is Neither"], National Catholic Register, January 15, 2008

In March 1999,{{Cite news |publisher=Agence France-Presse |title=US-based Catholic group, feminists oppose Vatican position at UN |date=March 15, 2000 |url=http://www.seechange.org/media/AFP,%20March%2015,%202000.htm}} CFC launched an unsuccessful campaign to downgrade the status of the Holy See in the United Nations to that of an NGO from that of a non-member state.{{Cite news |title=Pro-Choice Catholic Group Challenges Vatican at U.N. |publisher=Religion News Service |date=June 2000 |first=Kevin |last=Eckstrom}} Had the campaign, branded as "See Change", been successful, the Vatican would no longer have had a vote on UN policy nor speaking rights.{{Cite news |work=Ottawa Citizen |title=Canadians join move to oust Vatican from UN International coalition |first=Christopher |last=Shulgan |date=April 19, 1999 |url=http://www.seechange.org/media/citizen%204%2019%2099.htm}} The campaign drew support from 541{{Cite news |work=The Nation |first=Katha |last=Pollitt |date=June 26, 2000 |title=Women: Two Steps Forward, One Step Back?}} groups, including women's, family-planning and abortion groups, such as NARAL Pro-Choice America and Planned Parenthood.{{Cite news |title=Catholics bid to strip Vatican of statehood |first=Rupert |last=Cornwell |date=August 29, 1999 |work=The Independent on Sunday |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/catholics-bid-to-strip-vatican-of-statehood-1118215.html}}

The campaign was begun after Vatican representatives at various UN conferences blocked consensus on certain topics related to sexual and reproductive health, such as condom distribution and safe sex education in AIDS prevention programs and family planning, birth control, and abortion.{{Cite news |title=NGOs Call For Review of U.N. Status of Holy See |publisher=Inter Press Service |first=Mithre J. |last=Sandrasagra |date=March 14, 2000 |url=http://www.ipsnews.net/2000/03/politics-ngos-call-for-review-of-un-status-of-holy-see/}}{{Cite news |work=Irish Times |date=March 25, 1999 |title=Campaign to challenge Vatican's status at UN |first=Patsy |last=McGarry |url=http://www.irishtimes.com/news/campaign-to-challenge-vatican-s-status-at-un-1.166496}} Kissling, then CFC's president, asked: "Why should an entity that is in essence 100 square acres of office space and tourist attractions in the middle of Rome with a citizenry that excludes women and children have a place at the table where governments set policies affecting the very survival of women and children?"

The campaign was supported by European Parliament politicians from three Dutch parties.{{Cite news |url=http://www.seechange.org/media/Trouw.htm |work=Trouw |title=Doorbreek machtspositie Vaticaan |date=November 18, 2000 |first1=Lousewies |last1=van der Laan |author-link=Lousewies van der Laan |first2=Elly |last2=Plooij-van Gorsel |first3=Joke |last3=Swiebel |authorlink2=Elly Plooij-van Gorsel}} It was also supported by Marco Pannella, a founder of the Italian Radicals.{{Cite news |title=Italian maverick politician urges abolition of Vatican state |publisher=Agence France-Presse |date=November 27, 2000 |url=http://www.seechange.org/media/AFP,%20Italian%20MP.htm}}

The campaign faced difficulty in the UN from the start and, according to U.N. spokesperson Farhan Haq in 1999, seemed "unlikely" to succeed. Anglican Bishop John Baycroft said "The Vatican has as much right to be [in the UN] as any of the other countries", as the modern remnant of the Papal States. Pennsylvania State University professor Philip Jenkins wrote that the See Change campaign is anti-Catholic, and that the major diplomatic and mediation activity of the Vatican makes it deserve recognition far more than many other UN members.Jenkins, Philip, [https://books.google.com/books?id=p5SW0l7ciokC The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice], pgs. 84–87, Oxford University Press US 2003

In 2007, CFC's former Vice-President and Director of Communications, Jon O'Brien, was appointed President.{{Citation needed|date=September 2021}} In 2019, CFC's former Vice-President and Domestic Program Director, Sara Hutchinson Ratcliffe, was named Acting President.{{Citation needed|date=September 2021}} In October 2020, National Catholic Reporter columnist Jamie L. Manson took over as president of the organization, leaving her position at NCR.{{Cite web|last1=October 15|last2=Religion|first2=2020 {{!}} Angela Bonavoglia {{!}}|title=Pro-Choice Religious Community Making Their Voices Heard - Women's Media Center|url=https://womensmediacenter.com/news-features/pro-choice-religious-community-making-their-voices-heard|access-date=2020-12-17|website=womensmediacenter.com|language=en}}

CFC is not a membership organization but an advocacy group. It relies upon paid employees and committed volunteer activists that it selectively recruits in various regions.

In 2007, CFC had a budget of $3 million, increased from $2.5 million annually in the years leading up to 2003. It has been supported largely by secular foundations such as the Ford Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and the Playboy Foundation.Hunter, James Davison, [https://books.google.com/books?id=i4EuqIx6rtMC&dq Before the shooting begins: searching for democracy in America's culture war ], p. 74, Simon and Schuster, 1994

Criticism of CFC has largely come from authorities in the Catholic Church who disagree with the mission and purpose of the organization. Critics believe CFC undermines the Church’s authority through identifying as a Catholic organization while opposing the Church’s official stance on abortion.  They claim that CFC is not authentically Catholic, but rather a puppet of secular abortion rights organizations and a front for "anti-Catholicism".

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) opposes CFC and has stated that it "is not a Catholic organization, does not speak for the Catholic Church, and in fact promotes positions contrary to the teaching of the Church as articulated by the Holy See and the NCCB." This conflict came to a head in 1996 when members of CFC in the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska were threatened with excommunication if they did not leave the organization.[http://www.ewtn.com/library/BISHOPS/BRUSKWTZ.HTM Extra-synodal Legislation: Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz] at ewtn.com. March 19, 1996. Retrieved 2011-07-20. Kissling responded by saying that people in favor of abortion rights who consider themselves to be "Catholics in good faith" should just "go about their lives as Catholics."{{Cite news |work=All Things Considered |publisher=National Public Radio |date=March 25, 1996 |title=Nebraska Bishop Excommunicates Catholic Reformers |url=https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-28474856.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160529073110/https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-28474856.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=May 29, 2016}}{{subscription required}}

Helen M. Alvaré, an associate professor of law at the Catholic University of America, has asserted that CFC has "no grass-roots base among Catholics." She said the CFC arguments were not different from other pro-abortion rights groups.[https://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/27/us/27choice.html The New York Times. Backing Abortion Rights While Keeping the Faith. Banerjee, Neela. February 27, 2007] Pennsylvania State University professor and historian of religion Philip Jenkins wrote that CFC is a public voice for anti-Catholic opinions. He wrote that in 1991 Frances Kissling stated, "I spent twenty years looking for a government that I could overthrow without being thrown in jail. I finally found one in the Catholic church." Jenkins also writes that Kissling engages in "solid seventeenth-century anti-popery".Jenkins, Philip, [https://books.google.com/books?id=p5SW0l7ciokC The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice], pgs. 84–87, Oxford University Press US 2003

Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Nebraska, issued an interdict in March 1996 forbidding Catholics within his diocese from membership in 12 organizations including CFC. Bruskewitz stated that membership in any of these 12 groups "is always perilous to the Catholic Faith and most often is totally incompatible with the Catholic Faith." Members of the Diocese were given one month from the date of the interdict to remove themselves from participation in the named organizations or face automatic excommunication.[http://www.ewtn.com/library/BISHOPS/BRUSKWTZ.HTM Extra-synodal Legislation: Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz] at ewtn.com. March 19, 1996. Retrieved 2011-07-20. Bruskewitz noted that heeding the ban on receiving the sacraments, which results from excommunication, would "be left to the person's conscience."{{cite news |url=http://www.thefreelibrary.com/CATHOLICS+IN+12+GROUPS+EXCOMMUNICATED+IN+NEBRASKA.-a083932238 |title=Catholics in 12 Groups Excommunicated in Nebraska |date=May 16, 1996 |agency=Associated Press |work=Daily News |location=Los Angeles, California |publisher=The Free Library, by Farlex |access-date=July 18, 2011}} Frances Kissling, then CFC president, said, "What we would advise people in that diocese to say is that, 'We consider ourselves to be Catholics in good faith, and we think you have rendered the wrong opinion, and to go about their lives as Catholics."{{Cite news |work=All Things Considered |publisher=National Public Radio |date=March 25, 1996 |title=Nebraska Bishop Excommunicates Catholic Reformers |url=https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-28474856.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160529073110/https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-28474856.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=May 29, 2016}}{{subscription required}}

• Elizabeth Farians
• Leadership Conference of Women Religious
• Pastor's Initiative
• Charlotte Clymer

{{Reflist|30em}}

• [https://www.catholicsforchoice.org/ Catholics for Choice] Official website
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20060323023421/http://www.catholicsforchoice.org/conscience/default.asp Conscience] Magazine
• [https://findingaids.smith.edu/repositories/2/resources/990 Catholics for Choice Records], at the Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College Special Collections

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Catholics For Choice}}

Category:Abortion-rights organizations in the United States

Category:Abortion-rights religious organizations

Category:Christian organizations established in 1973

Category:Catholicism-related controversies

Category:Catholic Church in the United States

Category:American Christian political organizations

Category:Catholic Church and abortion

Category:Catholic dissident organizations

Category:Catholic feminism

Category:Non-profit organizations based in Washington, D.C.

Category:501(c)(3) organizations