Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 2 — The Georgia Bulletin, April 13,1989
Capitol Abortion Rally
Targets Supreme Court
ANTI-ABORTION VIGIL — A woman who opposes abortion prays
amid the crosses in the symbolic “Cemetery of the Innocents” during
the April 9 pro-abortion march in Washington. (NC photo by Robert H.
BY JULIE ASHER
WASHINGTON (NC) -
Catholic nuns, lay people
and college students were
among hundreds of
thousands who par
ticipated April 9 in a march
organized by the National
Organization for Women to
keep abortion legal.
The U.S. Capitol police
and the District of Colum
bia police estimated the
crowd at 300,000. It was the
largest single demonstra
tion in the nation’s capital
in recent years, surpassing
the 250,000 who gathered in
1963 for the March on
Washington. The biggest
rally crowd ever recorded
was 1 million for a protest
against the Vietnam War.
As NOW marchers
gathered on the Mall, an
abortion opponent, Judie
Brown of American Life
League, at a press con
ference on Capitol Hill call
ed it “a march for death
and economic destruc
tion.”
Assembled in Lafayette
Park, near the White
House, were about 100 pro
life demonstrators, in
cluding Joseph Scheidler,
head of the Pro-Life Action
League in Chicago.
Led by NOW president
Molly Yard, the Rev. Jesse
Jackson and several
Hollywood celebrities, in
cluding actresses Whoopi
Goldberg, Cybill Shepherd
and Mario Thomas, march
ers jammed Constitution
Avenue as they streamed
toward the Capitol for a
rally.
Many waved wire coat
hangers as symbols of ;1
legal abortion and shouted,
“We won’t go back.”
NOW organizers said the
turnout illustrated abortion
rights groups’ fear — and
abortion opponents’ hope —
that the Supreme Court will
use an upcoming case to
limit abortion or overturn
the Roe vs. Wade ruling
that struck down state laws
against abortion.
On April 26, the Supreme
Court is scheduled to hear
oral arguments in the case,
Webster vs. Reproductive
Health Services Inc., a
dispute over a Missouri law
scuttled by lower federal
courts.
As a three-hour rally
went on at the Capitol,
right-to-lifers prayed
silently nearby at a
“Cemetery of the In
nocents,” consisting of
4,400 crosses placed by the
American Coalition for Life
at the Reflecting Pool to
symbolize the number of
abortions that take place
each day.
Many in the NOW march
wore white and purple, the
colors of the suffragette
movement at the turn of
the century.
Among them was Loretto
Sister Maureen Fiedler of
Mt. Rainier, Md., who said
she was there “to defend
the moral adulthood of
women.”
Sister Fiedler carried a
sign that read, “Tender
hearted nuns for choice,” a
reference to remarks made
in March by Cardinal
Edouard Gagnon, presi
dent of the Pontifical Coun
cil for the Family at a
meeting of U.S. bishops
and Vatican officials. The
cardinal warned against
diocesan marriage tri
bunals including women
Religious because, he said,
“their tender hearts” may
“play tricks on them.”
“I believe abortion is a
serious moral decision, a
moral issue but the deci
sion belongs with the
woman,” she added.
Sister of St. Joseph Jac-
quie Wetherholt from
Detroit said she was a
longtime supporter of
women’s rights and “had
no idea that there would be
the shift to pro-choice, but
I’m supportive of what is
involved (for a woman) in
a decision for an abortion.”
Laurie Quinn, a fresh
man at Jesuit-run Boston
Davis)
College, said she believes
in “a woman’s right to
choose.” Catherine Dar-
ensbourg, a Catholic stu
dent at Worcester Polytech
Institute in Massachusetts,
said Catholics” are
children of God” with “a
right to choose for
themselves.”
Catholic teaching against
abortion was reaffirmed in
1974 in a Vatican declara
tion that said church tradi
tion “has always held that
human life must be pro
tected and favored from
the beginning” and that a
“Christian can never con
form to a law which is in
itself immoral.”
As marchers assembled
on the Mall in the morning,
the American Life League
held a press conference on
Capitol Hill.
Calling the NOW march
“a march for death and
economic destruction,”
league president Ms.
Brown said she was looking
behind “the moral
abomination of abortion”
to see an America
“destroying” its future.
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She announced a new na
tional ad campaign to focus
on what she said was the
economic impact of abor
tion, that there will be
fewer young people to sup
port an aging population.
The first ad ran April 10 in
the daily newspaper USA
Today.
Monica Migliorino of
Milwaukee, a graduate stu
dent at Jesuit-run Mar
quette University and
director of Citizens for
Life, held up a photo of an
aborted baby to show “real
beauty that’s now crushed,
mangled and distorted.
This is what NOW is
marching for today.”
Dr. Mildred Jefferson, a
physician who heads Right
to Life Crusade, announced
a new campaign “to
liberate women from the
new slavery of abortion.”
Dr. Jefferson, who is
black, released a “a
declaration of in
dependence,” which said
NOW and other groups sup
porting a woman’s right to
abortion have “imposed a
new slavery on women”
and would “keep down the
costs of the poor by getting
rid of those who would run
up the costs.”
Nellie Gray, president of
the March for Life, said
April 10 that the 300,000 in
the NOW march should
make “everybody who
operates in the name of
right-to-life to get up off
their apathy and join the
March for Life.”
“I think the majority of
Americans are pro-life and
sitting on their apathy,”
she added. “We can easily
get that number of Roman
Catholics. I want to tell the
bishops to come to March
for Life and bring 50 per
cent of their parish.”
The annual March for
Life, held since 1974 on the
anniversary of the 1973 Roe
vs. Wade Supreme Court
decision, has brought
thousands of participants
to Washington every year.
Crowd size has ranged
from 35,000 to 40,000 in 1977
to 50,000 to 65,000 in 1981 to
71,500 in 1985. In January
1989, 60,000 marched. The
lowest number was 5,000 in
1987, a result of severe
winter weather.
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A CAREER THAN THE
She was an MIS manager with
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owned her own home, her own car and the
inside track to unlimited advancement in
the high five figures.
But the more Nancy Donovan
achieved, the less she received, the product
of some modern-day law of diminishing
returns.
In 1987, after much prayer and
thought, Nancy left the business world to
become a Sister of Mercy.
Now, while a theology student,
Nancy works for the Leviticus Fund, an
alternate investment fund whose members
place their resources at the service of the
poor through revolving loans. Her focus
is on business ethics, ori the role of religion
in eliminating poverty, and on the personal
and professional growth she derives from
community life.
For more information on a life of
Mercy, contact Deborah Doran, RSM,
Sisters of Mercy of Baltimore, 301-435-4400.
The Sisters of Mercy
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Marietta, Ga 30066
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