(LifeSiteNews) — Pope Leo XIV did not rebuke Cardinal Blase Cupich for honoring pro-abortion Senator Dick Durbin with a lifetime achievement award, and said that those who support the death penalty are “not really pro-life.”
On September 30, a journalist from EWTN asked Leo what he thinks about Illinois Sen. Durbin being set to receive an award from Cupich despite his support for abortion.
Here’s the video of the Pope responding to Card. Cupich granting Sen. Richard Durbin a church honor. 10 U.S. bishops have condemned the honor, given Durbin’s record on abortion. Pope Leo does not seem disturbed by the honor. Video: EWTN. pic.twitter.com/AzXIr34kR6
— Raymond Arroyo (@RaymondArroyo) September 30, 2025
Leo gave a long-winded answer that appeared to imply he did not have a problem with Durbin receiving the award.
“I think that it is very important to look at the overall work that a senator has done during … 40 years of service in the United States Senate,” he stated. “I understand the difficulty and the tensions but I think, as I myself have spoken to in the past, it is important to look at many issues that are related to what is the teaching of the Church.”
“Someone who says I’m against abortion but says I’m in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” the Pope said. “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, I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them, but I would ask first and foremost that there would be greater respect for one another and that we search together both as humans beings, in that case as American citizens or citizens of the state of Illinois, as well as Catholics to say we really need to look closely at all these ethical issues and to find the way forward as Church.”
“The Church teaching on each one of these issues is very clear,” he added.
Leo’s answer caused controversy among Catholics and other Christians online, as the Pope seemed to draw moral equivalence between the murder of millions of innocent unborn children each year with the execution of convicted criminals and the deportation of illegal migrants.
LifeSiteNews CEO John-Henry Westen wrote on X:
Memo to @Pontifex: Cardinal Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI) wrote in his 2004 memo on Communion and pro-abortion politicians: “Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia.… There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.”
With his Tuesday evening statement, Pope Leo appeared to affirm Pope Francis’ erroneous teaching that the death penalty is intrinsically wrong, in opposition to perennial Church teaching and Tradition.
Catholic philosophy professor Edward Feser, who co-authored a book defending the traditional Catholic teaching on the liceity of the death penalty, wrote that the Pope’s remarks are “manifestly false.”
“To cite just a few names among many, sainted doctors of the Church such as Thomas Aquinas, Alphonsus Liguori, and John Henry Newman were against abortion and for the death penalty, as were sainted popes such as Innocent I, Pius V, and Pius X. I imagine Leo would not dare to suggest these great heroes of the Catholic faith were ‘not really pro-life,’” Feser stated.
On the same day Leo defended Sen. Durbin receiving the lifetime award from Cupich, the pro-abortion politician announced that he will decline the award from the Archdiocese of Chicago after facing a strong backlash, including criticisms from several U.S. bishops.
