Posted on 01/17/2008 1:59:25 PM PST by Pyro7480
As we gear up for next Tuesday’s March for Life in Washington DC, I offer this list of challenges to the pro-life movement in America. If we really wish to beat the abortion culture we have to mature as a movement. Thirty-five years of the same strategies and ideas have not gained us the victory we seek because the fight against the most pervasive spiritual evil that has ever entered the world can only be won on God’s terms. The pro-life movement has invested more in political and cultural change than in spiritual change. Let us not be afraid to fight Goliath’s weapons of mass destruction with the faith of David who came against the giant “in the name of the Lord of Hosts.” (1 Sam 17:45)
Catholic and pro-life ping!
Brilliant.
My fellow Catholics: if you’re not assisting at daily Mass ... Please consider ... even just once a week ... make your way to daily Mass and pray for an end to abortion. Even if you work far from home, it’s likely that a parish near your workplace has a daily Mass schedule you can work around.
Good idea! I'm hoping to add a regular Spanish Rosary to our parish's Hispanic Ministry, and including a pro-life focus would make it even more effective. Might even draw in more non-Spanish speakers, which is one of my goals in the Hispanic Ministry.
After the #1 priority (prayer), I would place as #2 — Honesty about which presidential contenders actually have a pro-life record.
Giuliani and Romney both rate 0 out of 10. McCain is about a 6. Thompson is a 9. Hunter and Huckabee are 10’s.
11. Do not rely on political struggle alone: if every “mother” about to kill her baby had a self-understanding that that is going to make her a murderer, abortion would be as rare as any other murder even with the proabort politicians running things. Do not hesitate to morally convict those who commit abortions as murderers and those who support it — as complicit in mass murder.
Good analysis of honesty on the campaign trail.
In a sense, Father Tom is naming the things and prioritizing them -- Monsignor Philip Reilly is actually implementing these things today (and yesterday).
I find, having worked for Priests for Life, that it is more concerned with steak dinners and politics more than actual pro-life prayer and presence at the clinics...
I never knew of a time, when I worked at PFL, of Father Frank going to a New York abortion clinic on his own, even though he could have been supported by the Sisters for Life, and other New York pro-lifers...
I find what Father Tom to be saying on the money, and in agreement with what Monsignor Philip Reilly has been doing for years. Monsignor Philip Reilly's group in Atlanta, Georgia, will have a Mass at the Archdiocesan Catholic Center and then have a prayerful march to a Partial Birth Abortion Clinic (that is strongly supported by TBS/Time/Warner or at least was in the early 2000's).
What Father Tom is saying we should do is basically why I got fed up with PFL and left that organization...
People like Cardinal O'Malley, Cardinal Rigali, and other bishops were ahead of him in urging people to see this movie.
It is my personal belief that he does not allow himself to be guided by the Holy Spirit and spend more time in prayer than he does. He currently spends a lot of time doing things like programming computers for PFL, or working on his laptop, as well as his TV and Radio spots. He also spends alot of time managing PFL.
Some of that is fine. But if you look at how Jesus spent His time in the Gospels, He often went off to pray... Father Frank, on the other hand, has so overextended his time and does things like programming computers, that needed time for praying is just not there.
Where I am critical of Father Frank is that when I worked for him, and I knew he was in NYC, to my knowledge he never tried to make it out to an abortion clinic there to pray, as well as encourage others to pray and work in the pro-life movement. Just about any time I went to the abortion clinic in Brooklyn that Monsignor Reilly has a presence at, I almost 100% would see him there that day -- if I waited long enough. And there was even one Saturday at that clinic that we had more saves than abortions...
Father Frank is very much in the leadership aspect of pro-life as well as media presence. But I found that my spiritual life suffered while working for Father Frank Pavone.
For me, that is disturbing, as working for a Catholic organization that is pro-life, my spiritual life should have flourished...
Father Frank made it very difficult to attend Mass or other prayers because he had a very strict schedule and rules for people.
That might be okay (the strict rules, etc), but not if he makes what I consider was a huge blunder with the movie Bella -- several weeks before the movie opened, he should have been urging pro-lifers to action on this movie so that it could make it into even more markets thatn it did.
Instead, he did this about 2 months later, and after I had sent some really tough worded emails to PFL priests and to the organization. He then did respond...
When I left PFL, I honestly felt that if someone had asked if Father Frank Pavone was a good or bad priest, I could not answer the person -- I leaned towards the bad priest answer, but he does alot of good with the sacraments. But most of this masses are either on TV, or on the road, or by himself in the PFL chapel.
He did not pray with the PFL employees or offer to. I can never remember Father Frank ever giving him a blessing. This is a trademark of Monsignor Reilly. If you are at an abortion clinic, and he arrives. He will spent time talking to the person monitoring the women/girls coming/going, talk to the women/girls, and just before he leaves, Monsignor Philip Reilly would always give his blessing to those prayer warriors and counselors present.
I say this with the thought that I would get up at 4am to take Father Frank to the airport (or pick him up), and be with him at all other odd times of day and night.
Spirituality was not part of that presence. And he had difficulty dealing with anything more than he wanted you to do (because he is so overloaded with things).
He tries to compensate for that by making a set of rules for all his employees to follow so that HIS TIME is maximized.
In any organization, creating a person who is a stumbling block creates a problem, and that is exactly what Father Frank did.
One example was that only once a month the Pastoral Associates would be in for meetings with their laptops.
So even if Dr. Alveda King needed some minor thing for her laptop, that had to go to and be approved by Father Frank.
Things like that wasted his employees time and other peoples times...
This is using his prayer book (which is a three hour prayer book). The book allows one to pray just an hour or just a porton of an hour, and has included many devotions: Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Litany of the Holy Spirit, Litany of the Precious Blood, stations of the cross, Divine Mercy Chaplet, Rosary, etc.
Another trademark of this group, The Helpers of God's Precious Infants, is a 24 hour presence/prayer vigil for Good Friday.
He does not advocate money donations, but demands prayer and presence at the abortion mill.
PFL has helped with this as traveling priests have been a part of the prayer vigils, or part of the 40 Days for Life movement -- in other words, if during the 40 Day Fast and Prayer a PFL priest is in town, he will go out to the abortion clinic.
May I add number 11?
11. Work to provide girls and women a true choice. Support agencies that provide alternatives to abortion, such as adoption and keeping the child. If a women sins and has an abortion make sure she can find forgiveness through Christ.
** make your way to daily Mass and pray for an end to abortion.**
Do this! It’s great!
And dedicate a Rosary to ending abortion!
**11. Work to provide girls and women a true choice. Support agencies that provide alternatives to abortion, such as adoption and keeping the child. If a women sins and has an abortion make sure she can find forgiveness through Christ.**
An excellent suggestion. Years ago — nearly 30, I believe, a pastor in this area opened one house for unwed mothers so that they would have a choice. There are now four homes, totally supported by donations. And to top that off — the priest was just elevated from priest to monsignor by Pope Benedict XVI.
There was some controversy back when he started this, and his name was taken off of our parish Hall. We are working to get his name re-installed and to start calling our hall by the dedicated name.
the pro-life movement needs to humbly admit that abortion is such a massive evil and so deeply rooted in our social fabric that no human power can eliminate it. While we need to vote for pro-life politicians, they are not our saviors. Abortion needs to be driven out by the spiritual authority of Christ’s church like an unclean spirit. Once the pro-life movement begins to seriously fight abortion in its spiritual dimension, we will see some real pro-life victories in politics and society. We can’t say that prayer hasn’t worked until it’s actually been tried.Would this suggestion not alienate Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and atheists who sincerely believe abortion is wrong?
Not necessarily. If I recall correctly, there a Jewish rabbi is an advisor to HLI.
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