Catholic News Agency reports on January 10, 2026, that Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser admitted the pro-life movement is “not safe” within the Republican Party while urging continued political advocacy to protect the Hyde Amendment. The article frames abortion as a policy debate requiring renewed Republican commitment rather than addressing the theological root cause: society’s collective apostasy from Christ the King.
Naturalistic Framing of Moral Catastrophe
The entire discourse reduces the mass slaughter of innocents to mere political negotiation, exemplified by Dannenfelser’s complaint that Donald Trump now considers Hyde Amendment protections negotiable: “Flexibility should be reserved for what you wear tomorrow… This is a matter of life and death.” This rhetorical contrast unwittingly exposes the movement’s fundamental error – treating child murder as a variable in electoral calculus rather than the bloody fruit of nations rejecting their Sovereign.
Pius XI’s encyclical Quas Primas (1925) establishes that “the hope of lasting peace among nations… will not shine until men and states submit to the sweet dominion of Christ the King” (§1). The article’s exclusive focus on legislative technicalities (“permanent law,” “taxpayer funding,” “federal level”) constitutes a modernist omission of the primacy of divine law over human politics. Nowhere does Dannenfelser reference the non possumus of Catholic tradition – that no compromise exists with intrinsic evil (Pius IX, Syllabus of Errors, Condemned Proposition 15).
Ecclesiological Amnesia in “Pro-Life” Strategy
The report commits the grave error of treating abortion as an autonomous political issue rather than a symptom of society’s rebellion against the Church’s divine constitution. When Dannenfelser states “We can’t hold back in demanding what has been promised,” she operates within the liberal framework critiqued by Pius IX: “The Roman pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself with progress, liberalism, and modern civilization” (Condemned Proposition 80).
Nowhere does the analysis mention that Quas Primas instituted Christ the King’s feast specifically to combat “laicism, its errors and impious endeavors” which “denied the reign of Christ over all nations” (§24). The article’s silence on the necessity of civil governance submitting to ecclesiastical authority (Pius IX, Syllabus, Condemned Propositions 39, 55) reveals its captivity to Americanist heresy.
False Hope in Political Machinery
The admission that “the pro-life movement is not safe in the current Republican party” still clings to the delusion that political renewal can occur without doctrinal conversion. St. Pius X’s condemnation of the Sillonists applies perfectly: “They are prepared to leave the supernatural and descend with their Savior onto the terrain of naturalism and secularism” (Notre charge apostolique, 1910).
Dannenfelser’s strategy of “communicating the moral position and also the political position” ignores Leo XIII’s teaching that “it is quite unlawful to demand, defend, or to grant unconditional freedom of thought, speech, writing, or religion” (Libertas Praestantissimum, 1888, §42). The movement’s failure to demand legal recognition of Catholicism as the sole true religion (Condemned Proposition 77) renders its efforts spiritually sterile.
Conclusion: The Only Path to Victory
Until the pro-life movement abandons its liberal presuppositions and embraces the integral Catholic program – demanding civil laws conform to divine law, rejecting false ecumenism, and restoring Christ’s social reign – it will remain what Pius XI called “a body without a soul” (Divini Redemptoris, §33). The article’s focus on maintaining Hyde Amendment exemptions constitutes surrender, for as the Syllabus reminds: “In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State” (Condemned Proposition 77). True victory requires rejecting this heresy and obeying Pius IX’s imperative: “Hold the faith; seek the unity of the Church; destroy the arguments of heretics” (Ineffabilis Deus).
Source:
Pro-life leader says movement 'not safe' in Republican party: 'We can't hold back' (catholicnewsagency.com)
Date: 10.01.2026