Hundreds of pro-abortion demonstrators tried to block a monthly pro-life march and prayer vigil at a New York City Planned Parenthood on Saturday, setting off a tense, hours’ long confrontation in Lower Manhattan.
With NYPD officers slowly pushing against the crowd, the marchers eventually reached the facility. There were no immediate reports of arrests.
A counter-demonstration organized by NYC for Abortion Rights began Saturday morning outside the Basilica of Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Mulberry Street, where a monthly Witness for Life Mass is held at 8am on the first Saturday of the month. The Mass is followed by the recitation of the Rosary outside the nearby Planned Parenthood; then Benediction is held back at the basilica before a social with the Sisters of Life.
On Saturday, counter-demonstrators tried to stop participants from leaving the basilica, though marchers managed to slip out a back door, AMNY reported.
The marchers’ path was blocked by pro-abortion protesters who pushed back against police trying to clear the way.
Kathryn Jean Lopez, senior fellow at the National Review Institute and an editor-at-large of National Review, tweeted from the scene that it took marchers more than an hour to reach the facility, which is just a block from the basilica. Marchers were “praying all the way,” she said.
Outside the basilica, demonstrators chanted, “Thank God for abortion,” and “F—— the Church,” among other slogans.
The demonstration comes a little over a week since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 landmark decision that legalized abortion nationwide. With Roe no longer in effect, the issue of abortion is left up to the states to legislate.
Photojournalist Jeffrey Bruno captured the march and counter-demonstration for CNA.
