Love will help culture of life triumph over evil of abortion, priest says

Father Frank Pavone, left, the founder and national director of Priests for Life, based in Staten Island, N.Y., and pastoral director of the Rachel’s Vineyard post-abortion reconciliation ministries, talks with Msgr. Lawrence Moran, a retired diocesan priest, during a pro-life radio program on WHOJ, an Eternal Word Television Network station in Terre Haute, in late January. (Submitted photo)

By Tom McBroom and Mary Ann Wyand

TERRE HAUTE—Love, the heart of the culture of life, will triumph over the evil of abortion, Father Frank Pavone told 350 pro-life supporters during his keynote speech at the fourth annual Wabash Valley Right to Life fundraising dinner on Jan. 28 in Vigo County.

Father Pavone is the founder and national director of Priests for Life, based in Staten Island, N.Y., and the pastoral director of the Rachel’s Vineyard post-abortion reconciliation ministries.

He also serves as president of the National Pro-Life Religious Council, an interdenominational organization started in the late ’80s to promote Christian unity and bring faith communities together to work to end abortion.

“When we talk about fighting abortion,” he said, “when we talk about preserving, protecting, advocating for and defending the lives of the tiniest, weakest human beings, … this is a response that is the most basic and fundamental in the human heart and conscience. We’re protecting our children. … How much more basic can it get? We’re rising up and saying, ‘Don’t kill that baby.’ It comes from inside of us because [God’s] law is written on our hearts.”

His speech addressed “Working in Collaboration for the Culture of Life,” and was both a motivational message and an expression of thanks to pro-life supporters for their life-saving volunteer service in west-central Indiana.

During the fundraiser, Msgr. Lawrence Moran was honored for his many years of distinguished pro-life service with the organization’s Thomas J. Marzen Respect for Life Award.

The pastor emeritus of St. Patrick Parish in Terre Haute also serves as chaplain for the Carmelite nuns at the Monastery of St. Joseph and chaplain of John Paul II Catholic High School.

Msgr. Moran is a tireless participant in pro-life activities, and also co-hosts a Catholic radio program on WHOJ, an Eternal Word Television Network station in Terre Haute.

The pro-life movement is already victorious, Father Pavone explained, because Jesus Christ won the victory over death for us.

“I’m proclaiming the victory of life,” the priest said about his pro-life ministry.

“We start with victory because the kingdom of death has been conquered,” he said. “Jesus Christ is risen. … It’s my

full-time job to go around and say to people, ‘Live baby good. Dead baby bad.’ ”

The pro-life movement arises “in the hearts and minds of people who, from the youngest ages, understand that it’s wrong to kill a baby,” Father Pavone said. “This is the most basic insight of the human heart, mind and conscience. That’s why the movement brings such diverse groups of people together. Jesus Christ alone is the Lord of human life. This we proclaim, and must proclaim together.”

A baby’s body is torn apart in abortion, he said, and we must work ceaselessly to stop this legal bloodshed of defenseless unborn children.

“We are the brothers, we are the sisters, of those victims,” Father Pavone said. “We are the followers of the One who said, ‘Whatever you do to the least of these, you do to me’ ” (Mt 25:45).

People of faith know that every human person is made in God’s image and likeness, he said, and must work together to end the culture of death in society by defending the lives of voiceless unborn babies.

“The heart and core of social justice is precisely the right to life and the dignity of the human person,” Father Pavone said. “We must first help those who have the greatest need and then take care of the rest.”

That help must include ministering to women and men wounded by the trauma of abortion, he said, through 600 Rachel’s Vineyard Retreats each year and ongoing Rachel’s Companions programming that offers God’s love and healing mercy to women and men struggling with post-abortion distress.

“We are winning this battle,” Father Pavone said. “We are closer to victory over abortion than we realize. ... In the last 15 years, over half of the abortion mills in our country have closed. … We are winning ultimately because abortion destroys itself.”

God is the source of all truth, he said, and pro-life supporters uphold the truth about the sanctity and dignity of life.

“The world is getting weary of its covenant with death,” Father Pavone said. “[The late] Archbishop Fulton Sheen once said, ‘The world is tearing up the photographs of what it means to be human, but the Church, God’s people, are keeping the negatives.’ … You are giving yourself away in love, in service, in generosity, inspired by the greatest human rights cause of our time and of all time.”

After the banquet, Jennifer Buell, the chairperson of Wabash Valley Right to Life, said Father Pavone “reminded us that all pro-life organizations must work as if we are part of the same body. Each

pro-life organization plays a role in moving the pro-life cause forward. No one organization can be all or do all.

“We need organizations that assist parents in an unplanned, crisis pregnancy,” Buell said. “We need organizations that help to educate the public on alternatives to abortion, and we need organizations that lobby legislators to pass pro-life legislation. We can do more—and be more effective—by working together.”

(Tom McBroom is a member of St. Patrick Parish in Terre Haute.) †