China sends antiabortion protester back to Phila.

Deported from China on the eve of the Beijing Olympic Games, Michael McMonagle, 55, of Lansdale, believes he was able to draw attention last week to China's problems of religious freedom and forced abortions.

McMonagle, a veteran Catholic antiabortion activist, and two other protesters tried to pray and unfurl a "Jesus Christ is King" banner in Tiananmen Square on Wednesday and Thursday.

But when the protesters tried to hold a news conference with foreign reporters in the square, Chinese police sent them packing. McMonagle returned to Philadelphia on Friday.

"Just unfurling a banner in Tiananmen Square took every ounce of courage I had," McMonagle said.

With religion, China tolerates only church groups that are registered with the government.

With the one-child policy that encourages abortions, couples can now have more than one child - if they pay a fine. For many families, that can be more than a year's salary.

"In some parts of China, 10,000 yuan [or about $1,400] is the price of life," said McMonagle, cofounder of Generation Life, which advocates chastity for young people.

McMonagle said he was trying to raise money to channel to Chinese women who can't afford the fines but don't want abortions.

McMonagle was detained and deported with the Rev. Patrick Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition of Fredericksburg, Va.; and Brandi Swindell, cofounder of Generation Life of Boise, Idaho.

McMonagle called his Tiananmen Square protest "a chance in a lifetime." He said the location was intentional: "We wanted to remind people what happened there," referring to the 1989 student protests that led to the death of hundreds, if not thousands.

On the first day of protest, the trio was confronted by "Olympic volunteers" - whom, McMonagle suspects, were plainsclothes police. "They tried to block the view and asked us, 'Why are you doing this?' Then they tried to take our banner."

After displaying the banner for about 30 minutes, the protesters were escorted off the square and taken to a police station. Their banner was confiscated, but they were given a lunch of KFC chicken and sweet green tea.

The next morning, the trio knelt to pray at the same spot and invited foreign reporters.

This time, they were forcefully removed and questioned. At one point, a police officer threatened to jail them if they didn't pay $2,000 apiece for their plane tickets home. He even brought out a credit-card machine for them to use.

"We said no, and they threatened to put us in jail for five days," he said.

Placed into a police van at 7 p.m. and taken to a seedier section of Beijing, McMonagle feared they were going to jail.

The group was surprised when the van pulled up not to a detention center, but to a restaurant. The officers wanted dinner before they took the trio to the airport for a 9 p.m. Air China flight for Los Angeles.

McMonagle believes that the three were treated lightly because of all the world attention on Beijing during the Olympics. "I'd love to go back," he said.