CHICAGO – Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich has condemned what he called anti-Semitic statements made by Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan at a Roman Catholic church on the city’s south side.
He also rebuked Catholic priest Father Michael Pfleger for inviting Farrakhan to speak without consulting Cupich.
During a speech Thursday at St. Sabina Church, Farrakhan asserted people shouldn’t be angry with him if “I stand on God’s word.” He also said he knows “the truth” and “separate the good Jews from the Satanic Jews.”
Cupich says, “Such statements shock the conscience” and “antisemitic rhetoric — discriminatory invective of any kind — has no place in American public life, let alone in a Catholic church.” Cupich says he apologizes “to my Jewish brothers and sisters.”
Cupich encouraged “Pfleger to accept the invitation of the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center to meet with their leadership and dialogue with survivors.”
Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan says despite assertions by Facebook when it banned him from its platform, he is not a hater of Jewish people, not a misogynist nor a homophobe.
Farrakhan was invited to speak at the church by Father Michael Pfleger after Facebook banned Farrakhan, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, conservative commentator Milo Yiannopoulos and others, saying they violated its ban on “dangerous individuals.”
The Archdiocese of Chicago distanced itself from Pfleger’s invitation to Farrakhan to St. Sabina Catholic Church, saying Pfleger did not consult with Cardinal Blase Cupich or other diocese officials.
Pfleger defended his decision to invite Farrakhan to his church, saying he was responding to the Facebook ban as a defender of free speech.
