“If your institution has an AI chapter, CNS urges you to work with your students to reorganize the club and continue its important work promoting human rights without an Amnesty International affiliation,” CNS Executive Vice President Tom Mead wrote in June to the presidents of Catholic colleges and universities in the United States. CNS also called on college presidents to support efforts by the Vatican and U.S. bishops to encourage AI to reconsider its abortion-friendly position.  

“AI is proud of its college chapters, and you could help convince the leadership to drop the new position,” Mead wrote.

The letter follows upon public statements by Cardinal Renato Martino, President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, who told the National Catholic Register last month that if “Amnesty International persists in this course of action, individuals and Catholic organizations must withdraw their support, because, in deciding to promote abortion rights, AI has betrayed its mission.” 

Last September Bishop William Skylstad, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, warned AI that the organization risked dividing its members and losing the support of Catholics and others if it changed its long-standing neutrality on abortion. According to Amnesty International USA and CNS research, there are more than 50 Catholic colleges and law schools with student chapters.