Day 6: Prayers



Some of our members after Mass.
So much love.



Today was wonderful! Our Pro-Life club got to participate in helping out with Mass as EMs, Lectors, & playing the music and everyone did a great job. Fr. Brian encouraged the parishoners to join us in prayer in October, which is Respect for Life month and also the month of the Rosary. I got to speak at the end of Mass and let the members of this Mass know about everything we have been doing this year and all that we did last year and we just asked for their continued prayers and support and my heart just smiled afterwards!

A woman walked up after Mass and introduced herself and made a donation to our organization - which is something that literally hasn't happened before, like, we haven't done one cent of fundraising until, well, when she gave us her donation today. Then we handed out Baby Banks that will benefit the Pro Life efforts of the Diocese of Austin and also help our organization.

The OLOG statue in
our chapel.

The best part about the response after Mass though wasn't about the Baby Banks though. A couple came up to me and told me that they are just on campus this weekend visiting their daughter (who is coming to our meeting tomorrow! Thanks be to God for new members!) but they said they will be praying in communion with us from Corpus Christi and the man said that he will be praying the Rosary everyday in October to pray for our efforts and for the Unborn. I just felt so blessed and so encouraged right then. I'm tearing up as I type - which I could've predicted happening - because it is just so wonderful to know that not only do we have support on campus within our organization but that there are people all around that are cheering for us, praying for us, and it's so wonderful to witness the blessings that we have received this past year and I'm sure we will continue to receive due to the power of prayer and the support of others.

Our church is lucky enough to be hosting the Diocese of Austin's traveling Our Lady of Guadalupe statue for the next 2-3 weeks. She is the patroness of the Unborn and she is just beautiful and it was so nice to see people go up to her after Mass to take a moment to pray. Today is truly a day of blessings.

Day 5: Yellow Rope

Taylor at the Rally for Life Last year.
So much joy that day!

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, my favorite poet, has struck a chord in my heart once again - which doesn't really come as a surprise. This morning I went to pray at the mill and there were so many people there, I'd bet 15 at one point, and it gives me so much hope. It's strange to stare at the yellow rope 40 Days for Life has set out to mark the line between public and private property because on one side, the mill, there is so much sadness and darkness and death, and then on the public side, where we stand, there is prayer and dedication, love and hope. I feel so blessed to be on this side of the yellow line, but more than anything I wish the rope would disappear and the barrier between the love that we, as Pro-Lifers, have to share could overflow onto the private property, into the hearts of those conflicted young mothers.

This is one stanza from the poem "The Creed to Be" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox:

And clearer, sweeter, day by day,
Its mandate echoes from the skies,Go roll the stone of self away,
And let the Christ within thee rise.

If we truly want to make a change, we must roll the stones of self away and work to strip our world of the "yellow ropes" that separate the darkness from the light, the hope. It is in reaching in little ways that we can bring down the wall between Life and death. It is in taking this movement person by person, woman by woman, father by father, and especially child by child that we will be able to overcome the Culture of Death.

Day 4: Victory

I was unable to update yesterday but there was such a victory this week.

I found out that a friend of mine had her baby recently. When I met her she was 17 weeks pregnant, abortion-minded, and just very conflicted and under a lot of stress.

When I received word about the birth I was so excited! I just thought wow, this is real... women do CHOOSE LIFE! I prayed for her so much this year and tried, with all of my grand 18 yr. old wisdom, to be of some assistance (what can you say to someone who says "I don't think God is real anymore and I have an appointment for an abortion tomorrow"?) and although I personally really didn't have much advice to bestow on her it was wonderful to see how others could reach out and help her, how others could relate to her and really show her there are people who want to help you and love you.

The icing on the Pro-Life cake was when I heard the baby's name. It is the same name I have had picked out for my first born son for years. Not sure if I'll still keep it for my baby name now (gotta be original, right?) but it gave me chills that this child - the first child I have actually known while his life was in danger of destruction - will have the same name that I'd always wanted for my own first child. I don't know how to explain why it feels so special, it just does.

Day 3: We're Right

If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking.
-Buddhist Proverb



Outside the courthouse in Dallas
where Roe v. Wade was first filed.

 Of all the uncertainties that one may encounter in this war- are my prayers being heard? are my efforts making a difference? is all my hard work in vain? - the one constant we can always cling to is knowing that we have been chosen to defend the truth about Life. We are blessed in our knowledge by knowing that we, regardless of each battle that may feel lost, will win the war in the end- for Truth will always emerge, although some may try to cast a shadow over it in the forms of ignorance, bitterness, and denial. If Pro-Aborts are really Pro-"Choice," why not choose the Truth? Life begins at conception, folks. If that is the only ground that we can all agree on - it is, in fact, a solid, biological truth - then I don't understand how there can even be further discussion on the matter. Just a little thought today.

Wish I could spend more time thinking on this, but as I discussed yesterday, so much homework that must be done that really makes no positive difference in my life, no intellectual growth so far this semester. I just wish my classes were teaching things that would actually encourage new thinking... not just reading boring, unproductive books or learning about old political figures whose names all seem so interchangeable.



Day 2: A Poem

Today I was wandering around a website of poems by my very favorite poet, Ella Wheeler Wilcox, and I found this one and felt that it could very easily be applied to the Pro-Life movement and some of the frustrations I discussed yesterday:

Preaching vs. Practice

It is easy to sit in the sunshine
And talk to the man in the shade;
It is easy to float in a well-trimmed boat,
And point out the places to wade.

But once we pass into the shadows,
We murmur and fret and frown,
And, our length from the bank, we shout for a plank,
Or throw up our hands and go down.

It is easy to sit in your carriage,
And counsel the man on foot,
But get down and walk, and you'll change your talk,
As you feel the peg in your boot.

It is easy to tell the toiler
How best he can carry his pack,
But no one can rate a burden's weight
Until it has been on his back.

The up-curled mouth of pleasure,
Can prate of sorrow's worth,
But give it a sip, and a wryer lip,
Was never made on earth.

This week, I am definitely "feeling the peg in my boot." It is hard for me to know of the injustices the Unborn are facing and not be able to commit myself wholeheartedly to it. I feel so helpless sometimes. I'm finding myself bitter against my homework & my classes because I feel like I could be doing so much more to actually make a change rather than learn about little historical facts or other things that seem to vanish once the unit test is over. It's been one of those weeks where I just need to listen to "You Are Loved (Don't Give Up)" by Josh Groban on repeat. Praying for all those who began 40 Days for Life this morning.