NEW YORK (AP) — The Catholic League says it will sit out next year’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade in New York because parade organizers aren’t letting an anti-abortion group march.
Bill Donohue heads the Catholic League, a group that fights prejudice against the church. He said Thursday that his organization won’t participate in the March 2015 parade for the first time in 20 years.
Parade organizers said last week that they would allow OUT@NBCUniversal to march. That’s an LGBT resource group at the company that broadcasts the parade.
Donohue says parade organizers promised him that if a gay group could march under its own banner, an anti-abortion Catholic group would be included also. He says the organizers backed out of their pledge.
Parade spokesman Bill O’Reilly called the Catholic League’s decision disappointing.
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