FEMEN Protestors Attack the Same Pro-Life, Pro-Family Bishop Again

Life Sites News
October 27, 2013

In their second physical assault of the year on the same target, a group of topless women, thought to be paid “protesters” of the extreme-left group Femen, have attacked Andrè-Joseph Leonard, the strongly pro-life and pro-family Catholic Archbishop of Mechelen Brussels.

On Friday, October 11th, during a meeting at the Catholic St. Michael’s College in Brussels, four topless Femen activists stormed the stage wrapped in the rainbow flag, the symbol of the homosexualist movement, disrupting a lecture and throwing a pie in the archbishop’s face.

The bare-breasted women also accosted the speaker, French politician and leader of the French Christian Democratic Party Christine Boutin, who is known for her vocal opposition to legally recognised same-sex unions,

Femen, a radical leftwing feminist-anarchist protest organisation, has repeatedly targeted Archbishop Leonard for his outspoken opposition to the homosexualist movement’s goals.

In April, the group broke in on a lecture the archbishop was giving at the ULB University in Brussels during a public debate on blasphemy laws.

As the topless women doused him with water and screamed pro-homosexual slogans, Archbishop Leonard sat praying silently. After the ordeal, the archbishop kissed the image of the Virgin Mary on one of the water bottles that was used in the attack.

In the Oct. 11th pie assault, the Archbishop reportedly “stole the show,” raising more than a few smiles when he calmly tasted the pie.

The latest attack had followed comments by Archbishop Leonard to the press on the moral inadmissibility of child euthanasia. The Belgian parliament is considering a measure that would allow doctors to kill children and young people, to which Archbishop Leonard responded that the detrimental moral effect of legalised euthanasia “isn’t confined to the consequences on the individual that it claims, but changes the fundamental relationship with life and death in society, undermining the vital bond of solidarity of all citizens with those who suffer.”

The new bill proposes to extend existing euthanasia legislation to those under the age of 18 years if they request it with the consent of parents and a psychologist. Belgium’s loose euthanasia law has come under severe international criticism as it is revealed that staggering numbers of patients are killed without their consent or the consent of family members.

The bishop asked, “Is this decision …of entrusting to others the task of terminating our lives truly compatible with the Rule of the Law?”

The European Episcopal Conference issued a statement of solidarity with Archbishop Leonard, saying that the Femen activists are “totally implausible and without any sense of decency”.

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