Democrats are making abortion into a “sacrament” by completely eliminating doctors from the process, glorifying the act, and deregulating the procedure, according to the president and CEO of the world’s largest pro-life organization.

Shawn Carney is the president and founder of the annual 40 Days for Life campaign, which has just concluded in a record 703 cities around the world. The organization helps end what it calls the “injustice of abortion” by empowering people to take action against abortion on a local level through prayer and community outreach. Its annual 40-day campaign helps accomplish this goal by hosting public prayer vigils outside abortion clinics.

Carney said Democrats do not want any regulations on abortion.

“That’s been the message—that the Democrats are making abortion into a sacrament, and they don’t want any regulations on the sacrament,” Carney told The Daily Signal. “That’s why you see the FDA [Food and Drug Administration] doing things they never would have done before the overturning of Roe v. Wade.”

The FDA has removed many abortion pill regulations. It has allowed retail pharmacies, such as CVS and Walgreens, to offer the pills and has allowed the pills to be sent to patients through the mail, with both changes significantly expanding access to abortion.

According to The Washington Examiner, Kansas, Idaho, and Missouri are leading a renewed legal challenge against the FDA’s efforts to deregulate mifepristone, one half of the two-drug cocktail that is used to abort children under 10 weeks gestation.

Carney also told The Daily Signal that doctors are being removed from the abortion process as many states with more lax abortion laws do not require a doctor to perform the abortion. According to Carney, this is another way of deregulating the process and making abortion more like a sacrament.

“It’s really a brave new world when you get away from the original talking point which is, ‘I want this to be between a woman and her doctor,’” said Carney. “The abortionist isn’t her doctor. It’s usually not even an OB-GYN, and now it’s getting more rare than ever to actually see a doctor for an abortion.”

Carney also highlighted the fact that a Planned Parenthood in Iowa invented something called a “webcam abortion,” in which an administrator gets on a webcam with a woman taking the abortion pill.

Carney also said another way that Democrats are turning abortion into a sacrament by glorifying the act—he explained how left-leaning celebrities such as Alyssa Milano or Chelsea Clinton exalt abortion by invoking religious justifications.

“Actress Alyssa Milano articulated her pro-abortion stance, suggested that the decision to have an abortion should involve a woman, her physician, and, you guessed it—God,” Carney wrote in Townhall. “Chelsea Clinton went so far as to say it is downright ‘unchristian’ to overturn Roe v. Wade.”

This year’s 40 Days for Life Campaign came to an official close Wednesday evening. In Washington, D.C., organizers hosted a closing event outside a local Planned Parenthood.

“Even though the official 40 Days for Life campaign is over, the message was clear,” Michael New, leading coordinator for 40 Days for Life D.C., told The Daily Signal. “Building a culture of life is not a 40 days of the year activity; it is a year-round activity. Attendees left motivated to step up their efforts in preventing abortion and offering meaningful, life-affirming alternatives to women, families, and children.”

Carney said that the purpose of the campaign is to empower people on a local level to do something about abortion, to change hearts and minds, and to pray, fast, and call upon God. He also said that, according to ex-abortion workers who have joined his campaign over the years, the “no show” rate for abortion appointments goes up significantly when participants are outside clinics praying.

“Many of them don’t show up for their appointments, according to the Planned Parenthood workers who have left,” Carney told The Daily Signal. “They say that, according to Planned Parenthood’s internal number, the ‘no show’ rate for abortions goes up by 75% when we’re out there praying.”

Carney also told The Daily Signal that his campaign includes many women who have had abortions and women who kept their babies because they turned around at the last second due to the prayerful advocates outside the clinics.

The Daily Signal reached out to Planned Parenthood, the Biden administration, Chelsea Clinton, and Alyssa Milano for comment, but none have replied as of publication time.

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