Catholics for Choice Denounces Racist Policing After the Murder of Daunte Wright & Violent Harassment of Caron Nazario
WASHINGTON – Today Catholics for Choice, which uplifts and amplifies the voices of the majority of Catholics who believe in reproductive freedom, issued the following statement from President Jamie L. Manson regarding the police shooting of 20-year-old Daunte Wright in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, on Sunday and the police brutality inflicted upon Caron Nazario during a December traffic stop in Windsor, Virginia:
“Our hearts are broken today over the horrifying and senseless police shooting of Daunte Wright in Minnesota last weekend. Yet again, a mother is forced to bury her son. Yet again, a child will grow up robbed of their father. Yet again, a community convulses with anger and grief. And yet again, another unarmed Black man has been murdered at the hands of so-called ‘law-enforcement.’ The very fact that this is a pattern, and that the constant threat of deadly police violence is a reality of daily life in America for Black and brown people, is a sin that cries out to heaven for justice and should outrage every single person with even a shred of morality, compassion, and basic human decency.
“The history of policing in this country is written in the blood, sweat, and tears of Black and brown Americans, who are disproportionately and systematically targeted by the ‘law enforcement’ and ‘criminal justice’ systems at every level from racial profiling and police violence to disparities in arrests, sentencing, and incarceration. And as the verbal abuse, excessive force, and pepper-spraying endured by U.S. Army Lt. Caron Nazario at a Virginia traffic stop proves, not even the uniform of the United States military offers protection from violent assault and humiliation at the hands of police.
“At Catholics for Choice, we believe that ‘Black Lives Matter’ is a moral imperative. We denounce the evil of white supremacy in all its forms – the original sin of this nation, committed moment after moment, day after day, across generations and centuries against the lives, bodies, families, and communities of Black and brown people. We demand justice for all its victims, including Daunte Wright and Lt. Caron Nazario. We call for the dismantling of structural racism and white supremacy in every institution of our society, from law enforcement, criminal justice and health care to the church, the school and the family. And we commit to being an organization that recognizes the interconnections between racism, xenophobia, misogyny, ableism, homophobia and transphobia, and attacks on reproductive rights and justice, and that fights for an end to them all – around the world, across the country, in our communities, and within ourselves.”
Catholics for Choice shapes and advances sexual and reproductive ethics that are based on justice, reflect a commitment to a person’s well-being and respect, and affirm the capacity of all people to make moral decisions about their lives.