A Roman Catholic parish in the Old Town section of San Diego, California, featured literature in its weekly church bulletins that one Sunday said voting Democrat was a mortal sin and two weeks later called Hillary Clinton "satanic."
According to The San Diego Union-Tribune, the Oct. 16 bulletin of the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church contained a flier written in English and Spanish listing legislative policies including same-sex marriage, support for abortion, euthanasia, and others that it said will send politicians and their voters to hell.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego spokesman Kevin Eckery told the Union-Tribune that neither the diocese or the parish approved the insert.
The bulletin that followed two weeks later on Oct. 30 published an article titled "Voting Catholic" that claimed Democratic Party presidential nominee Hillary Clinton was influenced by Satan through her use of tactics pioneered by community organizer Saul Alinsky.
According to NBC News, the article quoted Clinton's April 2015 speech at the Woman in the World Summit, where she talked about the role of abortion in gaining rights and freedoms for women.
Roman Catholic Bishop of San Diego Robert McElroy stated in response to the second bulletin, “While we have a moral role to play in explaining how Catholic teaching relates to certain public policy issues, we must not and will not endorse specific candidates, use parish media or bulletins to favor candidates or parties through veiled language about selectively chosen issues, or engage in partisan political activity of any kind,” NBC reported.
Several parishoners told NBC that they believed the handouts were out of line. The diocese said that it plans to send out a reminder to its churches that they should not make statements about specific political candidates.
Eckery told The San Diego Union-Tribune that while the article came from within the parish, he wasn't clear whom the author was, or who approved it for the bulletin. “The pastor [Rev. Richard Perozich] said it was not something he had reviewed or approved,” Eckery said.
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