Pro-life ministries getting boost

By Tanya Connor

The Catholic Free Press

With the 25th anniversary of Pope St. John Paul II’s encyclical “The Gospel of Life” (“Evangelium Vitae”) approaching, the Worcester diocesan Respect Life Office is trying to renew parish respect life ministries, according to the director, Allison LeDoux.

With that in mind, she has offered training sessions for priests and parish representatives.

A national respect life initiative is also being planned for the encyclical’s anniversary.

Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann presented it on Nov. 11 at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ fall general assembly in Baltimore. The archbishop of Kansas City, Kansas, he is chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities.

This effort to get parishes more involved in helping women with challenging pregnancies is called “Walking With Moms in Need: A Year of Service.” It is to begin on March 25, 2020, the 25th anniversary of “Evangelium Vitae.”

The USCCB pro-life activities committee is developing educational, pastoral, and action-oriented materials in English and Spanish to be posted on the committee’s website, www.usccb.org/about/pro-life-activities, for parish use during the year.

Mrs. LeDoux told The Catholic Free Press Tuesday that this initiative “provides an opportunity for us to renew our commitment in service of life.”

The initiative is timed nicely, given that states are passing laws which expand abortion access, she said.

“We have to proclaim that Gospel of Life message,” she said; nobody should feel abortion is the only option. The Church has been providing alternatives for decades, and it is helpful for people in the pew to know where to send those who need such resources.

Speaking of her office’s efforts to renew parish pro-life ministries, Mrs. LeDoux said volunteers are hard to get as older ones retire or move and don’t find younger ones to mentor.

At the first parish representatives’ training session a few weeks ago, she said that one question she hears is, “How do we reach people in the pew?” They’re the ones who will witness to others, so they need to be equipped to do so, she said.

The pro-life message needs to be integrated into all of Catholic life, she said. It’s a fundamental part of what it means to be Catholic; Catholics are called to protect life from conception to natural death.

She gave the following information to parish representatives, which she said was similar to what she shared in the priests’ training sessions.

Issues in pro-life ministry include abortion, post-abortion healing, contraception (which includes abortifacients), assisted reproductive technology, stem cell research and Catholic health care ethics, she said. In the parish representatives’ training session she focused primarily on abortion.

She said the U.S. bishops’ “Pastoral Plan for Pro-life Activities,” which reflects “Evangelium Vitae,” calls for pro-life outreach in four areas: prayer and worship, education, pastoral care and public policy.

“You don’t have to reinvent the wheel” when forming a parish respect life ministry, she said. The Church has provided the framework through this pastoral plan.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops creates an annual respect life program, which her office mails to the parishes and schools in the diocese each September, Mrs. LeDoux said. It can also be accessed through the website www.respectlife.org.     

This year’s program, for October 2019 to September 2020, is called, “Christ our Hope in Every Season of Life” and includes educational articles and other resources.

In the Worcester Diocese, parish respect life ministry coordinators must be designated by their pastors, Mrs. LeDoux said.

Mrs. LeDoux said it’s important for respect life ministry members to build relationships with their pastor, other clergy, and parish staff and ministries. For example, the respect life ministry could give prayer cards to the people who minister to shut-ins, to help the shut-ins participate in the pro-life efforts by praying.

“How do we know what to do?” Mrs. LeDoux asked, and provided some answers.

She suggested praying (“It’s amazing what the Holy Spirit does”), discussing “Evangelium Vitae” and other documents about the Church’s pro-life mission, and discerning one’s gifts and the parish’s gifts.

Parishioners can look at what the parish is already doing, and what else they can do, she said. For example, they might add an educational component to their baby bottle drive, which collects money to help pregnant women in crisis.

Mrs. LeDoux talked about ways parishes can respond to the four areas of outreach that the U.S. bishops’ pastoral plan calls for.

For the area of prayer and worship, she talked about the prayers and bulletin quotes she emails parishes each month from the U.S. bishops’ Word of Life series. (She said Msgr. James P. Moroney wrote the prayers when he worked at the USCCB. He is now rector of St. Paul Cathedral in Worcester and director of the diocesan Office for Divine Worship.)

Parishes can also order prayer cards from the USCCB and schedule holy hours. Another way to pray is with 40 Days for Life, standing outside an abortion clinic, which Mrs. LeDoux said is “really life-saving work.”

Parishes can use a different focus for worship, depending on the season, she said. In January there is the national Day of Prayer and Penance for restoration of legal protection for the unborn. In the spring, Divine Mercy Sunday provides an opportunity to look at post-abortion healing.

Locally, education seems to be the weakest of the pastoral plan’s four areas, Mrs. LeDoux said. To improve on that, her office can give presentations, such as formation for catechists. Parishes can also educate parishioners through their Sunday bulletins, bulletin boards, websites and faith formation programs.

The area of pastoral care includes Project Rachel, the confidential post-abortion healing ministry her office coordinates, and referring people to places that can help with crisis pregnancies and end of life issues, Mrs. LeDoux said. She noted that there are Catholic proxy forms to help people with ethical health care decision-making.

Speaking about the pastoral plan’s fourth area, She said the Massachusetts Catholic Conference, the bishops’ public policy office, alerts people in the state when action is needed in response to certain bills in the legislature. The MCC is watching the ROE Act which seeks to expand abortion access, and legislation to legalize physician assisted suicide, she said.

Parishes can inform parishioners what action is needed and when, through their parish bulletins, websites and e-mails, she said.

She asked the parish representatives to inform her office about what they are doing so she can share it with others who might want to participate.

“You are not alone,” she said. “We’re all connected. We’re all part of the wider Church.”