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October 4, 2020By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press
WORCESTER – “Abortion is a … blight on the soul of our great nation, and it cries out to the heavens for penance and reparation,” Bishop McManus said at Respect Life Sunday Mass, Oct. 4, at St. Paul Cathedral. He urged listeners to contact their legislators about a bill that could increase abortions in Massachusetts.
He said that a “grossly immoral abortion bill,” called the ROE Act, being considered by legislators in Boston, would worsen the present situation in at least three ways: young girls would no longer need their parents’ consent to have an abortion, there would no longer be any legal requirement to try to save the life of a baby who survived an abortion attempt, and late-term abortions would no longer be required to be performed in a hospital.
“This bill borders on the barbaric,” Bishop McManus said. “I ask all of you to please contact your legislators” and express strong opposition to it.
To be authentically Catholic is to be fully committed to the protection of human life, whether of the unborn or those with medical challenges languishing in nursing homes, the bishop said.
He began his homily by saying that the United States bishops designated this Sunday as Respect Life Sunday and that it was fitting to honor people who have worked to protect human life from conception to natural death.
Those honored represent a wide spectrum of Catholics who defend human life, the bishop said, and told a bit about each.
One is a retired priest who promoted life in his parishes, he said of Father Joseph M. Nally, to whom he gave the Gospel of Life Award at the end of Mass. Another is a mother of three and grandmother of 19 (Rosalie Berquist, recipient of a Mother Teresa Pro-Life Award), who, with her late husband, Duane, promoted life for the most vulnerable and taught others to do so, he said.
Bishop McManus described this year’s other recipient of the Mother Teresa Pro-Life Award, Joseph Williams, as a father of nine who for more than 15 years was president of the board of Visitation House, which provides a home for women in need and their babies. 
The recipient of the Ruth V.K. Pakaluk Pro-Life Youth Award, Catherine Villa, is a recent graduate of the College of the Holy Cross who has repeatedly attended the March for Life in Washington, D.C., with thousands of others, mostly young people, the bishop said. He gave a historical reason for that march: the 1973 United States Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, which he said made U.S. laws about abortion among the most liberal in the world.
Since then the Catholic Church has been in the forefront of forming people’s consciences to help them recognize the horrific evil of abortion, he said.
He told how Pope John Paul II taught that all Catholics have the responsibility of defending human life against abortion, and said the pope also pointed out that Catholics involved in lawmaking bodies must oppose laws that attack human life.
Bishop McManus told of Mother Teresa of Kolkata, who, upon receiving an honorary doctorate from Harvard University, said that any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use violence to get what they want.
The bishop expressed hope that Jesus, Lord of Life, whom his listeners were about to receive in the Eucharist, would give them the grace and courage to promote human life – for God’s glory and the salvation of souls.
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