Bishop Thomas Paprocki by the Diocese of Springfield / Facebook
In a “fraternal correction” published Sept. 23 in First Things, Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois, has issued a formal call for Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago to reverse a decision he says “threatens to scandalize the faithful and injure the bonds of ecclesial communion.”
Last week, the Archdiocese of Chicago announced its plan to bestow a “lifetime achievement award” on pro-abortion U.S. Senator Dick Durbin at a Nov. 3 fundraiser hosted by the Office of Human Dignity and Solidarity.
On Sept. 19, Bishop Paprocki issued his first public statement correcting Cardinal Cupich, noting that “honoring a public figure who has actively worked to expand and entrench the right to end innocent human life in the womb undermines the very concept of human dignity and solidarity that the award purports to uphold.”
In his second public statement , Bishop Paprocki called the move “gravely mistaken,” arguing that honoring Durbin — a Catholic lawmaker with a long record of supporting abortion — runs contrary to both the moral teachings of the Church and the stated policies of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and the Chicago archdiocese itself.
“Throughout his tenure,” Bishop Paprocki wrote, “Sen. Durbin has been an outspoken proponent of legal abortion. In his nearly three decades in the U.S. Senate, Durbin has dedicated himself to creating, preserving, and expanding a legal right to abortion — that is, a legal right to kill an innocent human being in the womb.”
Bishop Paprocki noted that Cardinal Cupich is disregarding both national and local Church norms by allowing this award to proceed: “It is unclear why Cardinal Cupich saw fit to ignore both his brother bishops and his own diocesan policy manual.”
Adding to the tension is the fact that, according to Bishop Paprocki and public records, Durbin resides in Bishop Paprocki’s diocese, as Catholic Vote previously reported. In his response to the outcry about the award, Cardinal Cupich says Durbin is registered as a parishioner at a church in the Archdiocese of Chicago.
Since 2004, Durbin has been prohibited from receiving Holy Communion in Springfield under Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law for “obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin” through his public support for abortion.
“Cardinal Cupich did not consult with me about this award or even notify me about his decision,” Bishop Paprocki said. “I learned about it in the media.”
Bishop Paprocki was especially critical of the award’s framing under the theme of “human dignity and solidarity,” pointing out the deep contradiction in honoring someone who has fought to exclude unborn children from the protection of law.
“This is darkly ironic,” he wrote, “because the slaughter of the innocents in utero is nihilistic and always without hope, and the policies Durbin has supported have denied a lifetime to countless unborn children.”
The bishop referenced Durbin’s votes against the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act and the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act as particularly egregious examples of Durbin’s “appalling record.” In Bishop Paprocki’s view, these votes render Durbin “unfit to receive the proposed award or any Catholic honor.”
In a Sept. 23 post on X, Bishop James Conley of Lincoln Nebraska also spoke out against honoring Durbin.
“I too was shocked and bewildered to learn of this Lifetime Achievement Award to be presented to U.S. Senator Dick Durbin,” he wrote. “The senator’s public record has been consistently pro-abortion and he has opposed any protections or safeguards for unborn children in the womb, even to the point of rejecting legislation to protect children who survive failed abortion.”
While acknowledging the political and pastoral sensitivity involved, Bishop Paprocki emphasized the spiritual harm caused by granting honors to politicians who violate core teachings of the Church. Quoting the USCCB, he said, “Being ‘right’ in such matters [as immigration] can never excuse a wrong choice regarding direct attacks on innocent human life. Indeed, the failure to protect and defend life in its most vulnerable stages renders suspect any claims to the ‘rightness’ of positions in other matters affecting the poorest and least powerful of the human community.”
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco shared the First Things editorial on X offering an analogy supporting Bishop Paprocki’s point about the folly of being selective in which Church teachings are to be followed.
This act of public correction, Bishop Paprocki explained, is rooted not in hostility but in ecclesial responsibility: “I offer this fraternal correction in the hope that Cardinal Cupich might reverse this erroneous decision, and so preserve the integrity of the Church’s moral teaching and avoid the scandal that this decision will otherwise cause to the faithful.”
Bishop Paprocki, who is the newly elected chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Canonical Affairs and Church Governance, stressed that his concern is not merely doctrinal but pastoral.
“People will be understandably confused as to whether the Church is sincere in its opposition to abortion, as to whether the Church really views abortion as a matter of life and death, and as to whether the Church believes human dignity is really at stake,” he wrote. “Some Catholics may conclude that abortion is, at the end of the day, really not that important. They may conclude that some of the Church’s teaching can be safely ignored if one supports other policies that are consistent with the Church’s teachings on other matters, such as immigration.”
In recent years, debates over whether pro-abortion Catholic politicians should be honored or receive Communion have sharpened divides within the Church in the U.S. Bishop Paprocki’s intervention is one of the most direct criticisms so far of a fellow bishop’s decision to publicly honor such a figure.
