WASHINGTON – Thousands gathered in the nation’s capital on Jan. 19 for the 51st annual National March for Life, braving the inclement weather to support women and their preborn children.
The theme of this year’s March, “With Every Woman, For Every Child,” renewed and resonated with defenders of the right to life, who marched to support women facing crisis pregnancies and their preborn children.
About 50 people joined Columbus St. Patrick Church for a pilgrimage to Washington for the March. The group spent time praying in front of a local Planned Parenthood facility, doing street outreach across from the White House and participating in the National Prayer Vigil for Life Mass and Adoration at The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
Among the members of the group were Fathers Daniel Bowen, O. de M. (Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy), who serves at Columbus Holy Family Church and as the vocation director for the Mercedarian order, and Michael Donahue, O.P. (Order of Preachers), the parochial vicar and director of youth ministry at St. Patrick.
Gabriel Vance, the founder of Catholics for Life, a ministry active in street evangelization and sidewalk counseling outside of abortion facilities and head of Respect Life Ministry at St. Patrick, organized the pilgrimage to Washington with his mother, Lorraine. Vance has traveled to Washington for the March annually since 2008.
“The March is so inspiring every year, especially if you’re doing pro-life work very consistently,” he said. “It’s so easy to get burned out because you’re doing really hard work. You see so much loss if you’re outside the facilities regularly, and it can be easy to start to become discouraged about that.
“To see these people that have done so much more than you’ve done … and sacrificed so much can be inspiring and encouraging. It can really reinvigorate your desire to defend life and keep pushing on.”
Approximately 200,000 babies are aborted in the world every day, and around 2,300 babies are aborted in the United States daily, Vance said, according to a news release published on Jan. 17 by the Guttmacher Institute research organization.
He said the March for Life is an “eye-opening experience,” and it encourages many people who were not previously involved in the pro-life movement. The March is a reminder that people from across the country are fighting the same battle.
Pilgrims who traveled with St. Patrick’s group participated in a prayer and protest with other individuals and pro-life organizations outside of a Planned Parenthood facility the day before the March. The group returned to pray the Rosary outside of the clinic the day after the March.
Vance hopes people will continue praying outside of abortion clinics and offer sidewalk counseling in their area. In his ministry, Vance has encountered individuals and couples outside of abortion clinics who need to know they are supported and that God’s grace is sufficient for them.
“It is one thing to go to the March, but it’s another thing to give up your Saturday by yourself to be there alone when you’re not surrounded by 100,000 other people,” he said. “That’s when it really matters. It’s great that we all come together for the March, but then, what really counts is what we are going to do when we go back home.
“Once you start to go outside the clinic and see that it’s really hard not to keep going back and being like, ‘OK, I remember that woman; I remember that couple,’ and if I know there’s so many more people like that, how can I not go there to help those people?”
Erin Young, a parishioner at Sunbury St. John Neumann Church, joined St. Patrick’s pilgrimage to Washington with her three children: Lucas, 7, Gianna, 6, and Isaac, 4.
The March for Life is personal for Young, who adopted her three children. She is grateful for her children’s birth mothers, and she marches on behalf of the mothers who saved her children’s lives, she said.
Her daughter, Gianna, survived a chemical abortion. Gianna shared her story on the microphone at the prayer and protest outside of Planned Parenthood the day before the March.
Young recalled her daughter observing women, particularly one woman, enter the abortion clinic while the group was praying outside.
“She looked at that lady going in, and I looked, and I said, ‘That could have been your birth mom,’ and she’s like, ‘Yeah, it could have,’ and it puts in perspective – for her to acknowledge,” Young said. “She’s 6, but she’s used the word ‘courage’ (and said), ‘I’m so thankful that she was courageous enough to give me life.’”
Young felt it necessary, she said, to attend the March for Life, “especially since the Ohio vote last November was such an upset.” Voters in Ohio passed state Issue 1 in the state’s most recent election, enshrining abortion through all nine months of pregnancy in Ohio’s constitution.
Young hopes to make the March for Life an annual pilgrimage, or at least return every other year. She wants her children to grow through the experience, she said.
“They need to know that their birth mother gave up everything for them,” Young said. “I know, for some, it may seem like it’s selfish for the mother to have them put up for adoption. It’s even more selfish to have an abortion.
“I want them to know that God gave them this beautiful gift, and they’re not with their birth mothers, but God has set them on a path to speak out.”
She also believes it is what her children were “designed to do.” She was moved listening to her daughter speak to the crowd and her son, Lucas, hand out prayer cards to various people, saying, “I’ll pray for you.”
Young, who is a convert to Catholicism, said she did not have a strong pro-life stance because she did not have the knowledge and was not equipped. She wants her children to be formed and able inform others about abortion, so they can “open people’s minds to this is really not what God wants for us.”
Every woman’s situation is different with pregnancy and adoption, Young said. She knows many families who are seeking to adopt and open their home to a child.
“Babies don’t have to die,” she said. “There’s places for them to go, homes that they can go to. There’s families that will love them.”
Olivia Campbell, a high school junior and parishioner at Columbus St. Leo Oratory, has attended the March for Life with St. Patrick for several years.
She said the pilgrimage is a good time for her to pray and grow as a person. She attends the March whenever she has an opportunity.
“It’s to march for the babies, and it’s also kind of like a retreat for me,” she said. “It’s always a really good time for me to grow. … It’s always a really beautiful experience.”
Campbell recognized the pain that women experience after choosing to abort their child. She shared that her aunt and grandmother, who died recently, both had abortions. Her grandmother was pro-life.
“They suffered a lot from it,” Campbell said. “I think that might be part of why I always tend to think so much about the woman who’s been affected, too. It’s really horrible.
“She became Catholic with our family when we converted, and I know she was very sorry about it, and she had a very holy death. And my aunt, from what I’ve heard from my mom, that was when her life went really downhill.”
Campbell could attest to this year’s March for Life theme, “With Every Woman, For Every Child,” as she recognizes the devastation that abortion can inflict on women and their families.
She believes she will serve in pro-life ministry one day, she said. She becomes more convinced of this possibility when participating in the March for Life.
On Jan. 18, the evening before the March, Bishop Michael Burbidge of the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia celebrated the Vigil Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
Bishop Burbidge, who serves as chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Pro-Life Committee, encouraged defenders of life who gathered for Mass and in his homily said it was inspiring to see many young people gathered.
He also reflected on the reading from the conclusion of St. Matthew’s Gospel – the commissioning of the disciples (Matthew 28: 16-20). In the passage, Jesus Christ sends them forth to make disciples of all nations.
“The end of the story has not yet come,” Bishop Burbidge said.
He said God still has work to do in the hearts of His people, and the work of spreading the Gospel has only begun.
Bishop Burbidge acknowledged that God knows the work will be difficult and discouraging at times, and “the good works we accomplish will not always last,” but every person must spread the Good News.
“There is still work to be done,” he said.
The bishop reminded those in attendance that God will be there in moments of both elation and discouragement, and He will sanctify it all.
He also reminded the congregation that the right to life is a right, and it is sacred. He told those gathered that they must communicate the truth, even in the darkest places, adding that every life is worth the effort.
In moments of victory and defeat, Bishop Burbidge said, Jesus never changes. God’s work is not finished, and until it is, every individual must continue to bring truth to the darkest places.
He encouraged the faithful to keep Christ at the center of all that they do. He reminded them that God will be with them until the end of time, and He promises to make all things new.
The St. Patrick March for Life pilgrimage concluded Saturday, Jan. 20 with a Mass celebrated by Bishop Earl Fernandes in the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. followed by a tour of the St. John Paul II National Shrine.