Vatican dismisses ‘blasphemous’ Trump supporting, anti-abortion leader from priesthood – National | 24CA News
Father Frank Pavone, a frontrunner of the U.S. anti-abortion motion and a robust supporter of former president Donald Trump, has been dismissed from the Catholic priesthood for “blasphemous” social media posts and disobedience to bishops.
The Vatican defrocked Pavone in November, in accordance with a letter despatched to U.S. bishops from its ambassador to Washington. The letter, seen by Reuters, says Pavone is not going to be allowed to attraction.
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Pavone was defrocked for “blasphemous communications on social media and of persistent disobedience of the lawful instructions of his diocesan bishop,” the letter says.
In the 2016 presidential marketing campaign he launched a video of an aborted fetus on an altar and urged Catholics to not vote for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, who later misplaced to Trump.
His defrocking was first reported by the conservative Catholic News Agency (CNA).
Pavone, 63, a New Yorker, has had a scratchy relationship with a lot of his bishop superiors throughout his clerical profession, usually over actions they deemed too political.
After Trump misplaced to Joe Biden in 2020, Pavone was amongst Trump supporters who questioned the validity of the elections.
In a one hour, 40 minute video on Sunday, Pavone, nonetheless sporting a priest’s collar, stated he had been “persecuted in the Church for decades” and derided his critics as “the dumbest in the world.”
In a Twitter submit in 2020 he spoke of “supporters of this goddamn loser Biden and his morally corrupt, America-hating, God-hating Democrat party.”
He referred to that episode in his Sunday video, saying “I used the word G-D in a response to somebody in a Tweet and for that they want to throw me out of the priesthood.”
During the 2020 presidential marketing campaign he was reprimanded for suggesting that Catholics who voted for Democrats shouldn’t be absolved of their sins in confessions.
In his video on Sunday, he accused his critics of “spouting Democrat talking points.”
He stated he nonetheless had not acquired any official communication from the Vatican on his dismissal and criticized the Vatican for “talking to the media before you talk to the priest.”
He added: “I’m never going to leave the priesthood.”
— Additional reporting by Maria Caspani; Editing by John Stonestreet
