(LifeSiteNews) — Renowned Catholic professor John Rist shows that Pope Leo XIV, in his recent interview comments regarding the Durbin case, is “following in Bergoglio’s footsteps.” He even calls Pope Leo’s comments “shameful.”

The American Pope, in September 30 comments to journalists, declined to criticize the fact that Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago had the intention of awarding Senator Dick Durbin even though this politician is a strong supporter of abortion. On the contrary, the Pope insisted that one has to look at a politician’s entire work and career, adding that there are other important issues he believes are contrary to life, such as anti-immigration sentiment and the death penalty.

According to Rist, “when Cupich proposed to honor Senator Durbin, he remained silent while the dispute raged, then intervened in an exactly Bergoglian manner: we should put abortion in its context; there are other serious life issues. Thus he both finessed the seriousness of the deaths of millions of the unborn and failed to recognize that abortion is at the heart of the left-liberal, anti-Christian agenda.”

As he also points out, there is a long-standing and very consequential reluctance of Catholic bishops to clearly and courageously defend the Church’s stance against abortion.

Professor Rist is a world-renowned scholar of St. Augustine and the Church Fathers and had been outspoken against the teachings coming out of Rome under Pope Francis that are contrary to the Church’s tradition and doctrine. Rist was part of a group of scholars who accused Pope Francis of heresy. Subsequently he was barred from entering any pontifical university in Rome.

READ: Pro-abortion Sen. Durbin says he’s ‘overwhelmed’ by Pope Leo’s apparent defense of his award

Please see below the full interview with Professor John Rist:

LifeSite: Why are Pope Leo XIV’s comments on the Cupich proposal to award the pro-abortion Sen. Durbin so particularly important?

Prof. Rist: In order to evaluate Pope Leo’s shameful comments on Cupich’s proposed award to Senator Durbin, it is necessary to see the problem of abortion in context. The context is that the “right” to abortion is at the very heart of the left-liberal agenda: many of their other positions flow directly from it and it must therefore be recognized as posing a fundamental problem for Catholic ethics, indeed for any serious account of justice. That this question is so central is well shown by an event I learned of many years ago in Toronto, when a very well-known American public intellectual, speaking to a group of female graduate students, told them how lucky they were to be able to study philosophy at an advanced level. “And why can you do this?” she asked. “Because you can always get an abortion when you need it.”

Has the Catholic episcopacy more generally been ambiguous about abortion in the past?

Yes, indeed. For many years much of the Catholic episcopate has been very ambiguous about abortion. Verbally, of course, they have always condemned it, but when it comes to action, the matter is very different. Thus when I was involved in the pro-life movement in Canada in the late sixties and early seventies, the episcopal unwillingness to back up words with actions provoked the publication by the University of Toronto Press of an excellent book entitled Catholics against the Church: A History of the Pro-Life Movement in Canada. At that time the cardinal-archbishop of Toronto regularly forbade the display of pro-life literature in the churches of his diocese.

Why have Catholic bishops (and now popes) often been so unwilling to face the abortion problem head-on?

Precisely because they know that to attack abortion is to attack left-liberalism at its heart, and that those who do that will not only incur the wrath of the Western press and Western elites more generally, but that they will regularly be labeled bigots and fascists (as I have been myself). The episcopate – impelled by fear – has too often been unwilling to face the challenge that outright opposition to abortion invites them to face.

How did Pope Francis deal with the abortion problem?

Bergoglio was always ambiguous about abortion (as about so much else). He would condemn it as a dreadful crime and at the same time cozy up to the most active abortionists (not least, but not only, Emma Bonino, Italy’s foremost pro-abortion politician and, as a doctor, a regular committer of abortion herself). Bergoglio regularly practiced this ambiguity, and now Leo has followed him – again by claiming that abortion is only one of many moral issues and should not be overestimated.

So is Pope Leo following Pope Francis’s lead on the topic of abortion?

Yes, it seems that he is indeed following in Bergoglio’s footsteps, doubtless understanding that this is one of the things he was elected to do. So he recently had a cozy little chat with a Dominican sister, apparently without any suggestion that her pro-abortion views are wholly at odds with Catholic morality. Then when Cupich proposed to honor Senator Durbin, he remained silent while the dispute raged, then intervened in an exactly Bergoglian manner: we should put abortion in its context; there are other serious life issues. Thus he both finessed the seriousness of the deaths of millions of the unborn and failed to recognize that abortion is at the heart of the left-liberal, anti-Christian agenda.

What are we to conclude from Pope Leo’s recent actions?

That like Bergoglio he does not want to face moral reality. It seems that he cannot distinguish between the execution of some sadistic torturer and the convenience-killings of millions of unborn children, even, as Durbin wished, their killing a few hours before they would be naturally born. In sum, Leo has shown himself unwilling to recognize the particular moral iniquity of advocating the deliberate killing of innocents.

How do Pope Leo’s comments on the Cupich affair affect pro-lifers and the Church more widely?

Leo’s comments are a sharp kick in the groin aimed at all those hard-working pro-lifers who for decades – often facing insult and even imprisonment – have fought for the unborn. On abortion he has resorted to Bergoglio-speak and acted in a truly Bergoglian spirit. We might all ask why we have to put up with this. The answer is that when we saw Bergoglio himself in action, we refused to move against him, thus allowing his successor to begin to normalize his legacy.

What is your last word, from a strictly personal point of view?

If this piece is published, I shall probably once more be labeled a fascist; I am really looking forward to that!