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Pickets target Kennedy-led bash

The Center City Consortium's $1000-a-plate dinner on September 17 for Washington, D.C., inner-city Catholic schools was intended to be, as the old song goes, "a swell-igant, elegant affair."

But, stepping out of their Porsches and Mercedes-Benzes in the semi-circular driveway of the Capitol Hilton, women in svelte, shimmery evening gowns and men in tuxedoes were greeted by the disconcerting sight of 25 sign-carrying protesters.

The demonstrators were objecting to the presence of the notoriously pro-abortion Sen. Ted Kennedy, an ostensible Catholic, as co-host of the Catholic-sponsored event.

Pro-lifers displayed companion signs chiding both Ted Kennedy for his pro-abortion stance and Washington Archdiocese's Cardinal Theodore McCarrick for allowing the senator to have a place of honor at an archdiocesan event.

They also held large, graphic "Face the Truth" posters of aborted babies and hand-printed signs, such as the "Kennedy is a disgrace to Catholicism" sign displayed by Mary Susan Grayson and Maryland Family Values Alliance President Bill Devens.

The signs elicited rapt attention from motorists stopped along 16th Street for the red light at K Street.

"Everybody going by is seeing these pictures of abortion," said a feisty Ms. Grayson. "It's an education! If you think it's just a blob of tissue,look again.

"The people inside [the hotel] know what they're doing; their hands are bloodied. But a lot of people really don't know."

Ms. Grayson's peppery mood was typical of that of the demonstrators, who were visibly angry at the honoring of yet another pro-abortion Catholic politician by a bishop and fellow Catholics.

Protest organizer Janet Baker passed out fliers titled, "Why We Are Outraged," charging that the Center City Consortium "has prostituted its purpose for money thirty pieces of silver,as it were."

"It's disgusting," said demonstrator Bill Luksic,  shaking his head after a man going into the dinner said he was "proud" of Ted Kennedy,and gave Bill an obscene hand gesture.  

Many of the dinner-goers wore an air of studied indifference, pointedly ignoring the sign-carriers. Others looked irritated or annoyed. One woman kept her head down and held a newspaper in front of her face as she walked by the graphic signs.

But pro-lifers got their message across verbally as well as through signs.

"Teach our kids to respect all life," Cathy Roth called out to dinner guests. "Correct Ted Kennedy in love; that's the Catholic thing to do."

"Father,you shouldn't go in there-that's blood money," Joan McKee implored a priest. "Ted Kennedy does not represent Catholic teaching; he says kill your kids and everything will be swell!"

The priest waved her off nonchalantly as he went in the door.

In stark contrast, Fr. Peter West of Priests for Life boosted the protesters' spirits when he joined them and hoisted a sign.

"Are you going to get in trouble for this, Father?" someone asked.

"No!" he said-then corrected himself: "I don't know, and I don't care."

When Mrs. Roth spotted Cardinal McCarrick himself coming down the sidewalk, she fell in step beside him.

"I'm so disappointed that you're honoring Ted Kennedy," she told the cardinal.

"We're not honoring him; we're getting money for the kids," he replied.

"Money isn't as important as teaching our kids to be pro-life," Cathy insisted. But the cardinal only repeated that the senator was not being honored and hurried into the hotel.

Although District police have tried to restrict or disperse pro-lifers at recent demonstrations, the two officers standing  beside their police car at 16th and K streets offered no hindrance to the protesters.

"They're pretty friendly," said Dick Retta. "They told us to keep up the good work!"

Father West led the pro-lifers in a closing prayer. Then someone shouted, "Let's hear it for a real priest!" and they gave him three cheers.

"We had an impact on the cardinal, because he had to see the signs," said Jack Ames, director of Defend Life, which supplied many of the signs.

"He probably had the sense that this is the last time he can get away with this-not that he got away with it this time.

"I think he senses that he has not seen the end of pro-lifers; wherever he is going to be, they will be there with those embarrassing signs".

In addition to the cardinal, Ames added, "A lot of people going in saw our signs and understood our message."