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Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who has long supported abortion rights, declined a planned “Lifetime Achievement Award” from Cardinal Blase Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago, after backlash from Catholic bishops and lay leaders.
“Senator Durbin today informed me that he has decided not to receive an award at our Keep Hope Alive celebration,” Cupich said in a Tuesday statement. “While I am saddened by this news, I respect his decision. But I want to make clear that the decision to present him an award was specifically in recognition of his singular contribution to immigration reform and his unwavering support of immigrants, which is so needed in our day.”
Durbin’s backing down from receiving the award came following a CatholicVote petition on its online CatholicVote Action Center, where users could directly message Cardinal Cupich’s office, asking him not to honor Durbin for his support of immigrants. As of Monday, more than 20,000 had signed; by Wednesday morning, signatures had surpassed 40,000.
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“The importance of Senator Durbin declining the award offered by Cardinal Cupich cannot be overstated,” Kelsey Reinhardt, president and CEO of CatholicVote, told Fox News Digital Wednesday in a statement.
“Not only was the public outcry enormous — in just a week, 40,000 people messaged the Cardinal’s office from CatholicVote alone — he came to see what the Cardinal did not: Catholics are the backbone of the pro-life movement and they will stand and witness to life at every turn,” Reinhardt added.
Cupich’s award to honor Durbin was meant to be part of the upcoming “Keep Hope Alive Benefit 2025,” hosted by Cupich and the Archdiocese’s Office of Human Dignity and Solidarity Immigration Ministry at St. Ignatius College Prep in Chicago.
CatholicVote had said it supported plans by March for Life Illinois to peacefully protest outside the Nov. 3 event. CatholicVote said at least 10 bishops and archbishops had spoken out against Cupich’s plans to honor Durbin with the award, including Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Ill., where Durbin lives.
Other bishops raising concerns included Bishop James D. Conley of Lincoln, Neb.; Bishop James S. Wall of Gallup, N.M.; Bishop Michael F. Olson of Fort Worth, Texas; Bishop Carl A. Kemme of Wichita, Kan.; Bishop James V. Johnston of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Mo.; Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco; former Bishop of Tyler, Texas, Joseph Strickland, and retired Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann, formerly of Kansas City, Kansas.
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Pope Leo XIV commented on this situation Tuesday, responding to a question from EWTN News, saying, “Someone who says I’m against abortion but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life. Someone who says I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro life.”
“So they are very complex issues and I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them,” he added. “But I would ask first and foremost that they would have respect for one another and that we search together both as human beings, and in that case as American citizens and citizens of the state of Illinois, as well as Catholics, to say that we need to be close to all of these ethical issues. And to find the way forward as a Church. The Church teaching on each one of those issues is very clear.”
The Catholic Church teaches that direct abortion is evil and “gravely contrary to the moral law.”
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Reinhardt, the president and CEO of CatholicVote, told Fox News Digital, “Pope Leo said he did not have all the facts. But one man did: Bishop Paprocki.”
In an interview with The Pillar published on Sept. 20, Paprocki said that Durbin receiving the award would cause “great scandal.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Cupich and Durbin for comment.
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