One-year commitment turned to 40 for head of bishops' pro-life office

Published: 2006-07-21

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- When Gail Quinn came to Washington in 1966 to help establish an office devoted to family and pro-life matters at the Catholic bishops' conference, she didn't expect to stay more than a year. She never dreamed that, more than 40 years later, she would be sitting in her office as executive director of the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops as the U.S. Senate debated whether more federal funds should go to research that kills embryos. "Never in my wildest imagination," she said in a July 18 interview with Catholic News Service as she prepared to retire in August. The first woman and the first layperson to head the secretariat, Quinn was hired as an administrative assistant to then-Msgr. James T. McHugh, director of the bishops' Family Life Office. Msgr. McHugh, who died in 2000, was the first director of the newly established pro-life office and later became bishop of Camden, N.J., and Rockville Centre, N.Y. He was a family friend after serving as an associate pastor in Quinn's New Jersey parish. "So my parents knew that I wasn't going off alone into the wild blue yonder," she said.

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