January 3, 2005

Dear Friends,

Happy New Year!

Below you will find my column in English and Spanish

A word of thanks to all who participated in our Christmas Novena of Prayer for
our nation's courts and judges! I am confident we will make progress in the
upcoming battles for our courts. Meanwhile, we continue our ongoing novena of
prayer to end abortion. People can sign up at www.PrayerCampaign.org and you
can also order the prayer cards from us at orders@priestsforlife.org

You may not be aware of our "Questions and Answers about Abortion" page on
our website at www.priestsforlife.org/questions.html -- feel free to make use of it
and spread the word!

Also, on our online poll (right on our front page, www.priestsforlife.org ,) I'm
keeping the current question up there for another two weeks. It is an especially
important one, so please give us your opinion if you haven't already!

Finally, we are moving full speed ahead to Elections 2006, so that we may make
even more intense gains for the pro-life movement, especially in the US Senate.
Everything we did in the 2004 cycle will be repeated, intensified, and multiplied,
without compromise and without apology, and we will be victorious! While we
work in many other arenas of pro-life activity, and while we keep those who have
been elected accountable to the pro-life cause, let us all begin now to recruit,
train, and activate even more pro-life voters for the 2006 cycle!

God bless you for all you do!

Fr. Frank Pavone
National Director, Priests for Life

A Sad Day Each Year
Fr. Frank Pavone
National Director, Priests for Life

The March for Life is a strange combination of sorrow and joy. The sorrow comes
because we commemorate a Court decision that, although it lacks all authentic
validity, continues to allow the destruction of over a million children a year. Yet
the joy comes because we gather with thousands of other pro-life activists,
proudly taking part in the greatest human rights cause of our day, and we know
that our cause will prevail.

This year the March for Life will be held on Monday, January 24 rather than the
22nd (the date of the Roe vs. Wade decision), because the 22nd is on a Saturday.

While it is important to March, we should also understand that the March for Life
is, at its core, an educational effort about the "Life Principles." Miss Nellie Gray,
Founder and President of March for Life, has always stressed this point, and I
want to re-echo it. The Life Principles express, in a succinct way, the absolute
inviolability of every physical human life, and the fact that such a life has a right
to protection regardless of the circumstances of its conception. The Life
Principles are about equality -- the equality of the born with the unborn, the
healthy with the sick, the strong with the weak, the adult with the embryo.

One of the Life Principles states, "The life of each human being shall be
preserved and protected from that human being's biological beginning when the
father's sperm fertilizes the mother's ovum." This formulation protects us from the
linguistic tricks some play when they re-define "conception" or speak in abstract
terms about their philosophy of when a human being becomes a person. The fact
is that every biological, living human being is a human person.

The March for Life, as an educational effort, has a theme every year, and this
year's theme emphasizes that it is the duty of each American to uphold the Life
Principles without exception or compromise.

Our duty to these children is absolute, and admits of no exceptions. Although it is
legitimate to work step by step, incrementally, toward the protection of every life,
it is equally necessary to clearly and frequently articulate where we want to go: to
the protection of every life, without exception. The children conceived in rape and
incest must have equal protection. The children of mothers with medically
complicated pregnancies must have equal protection.

In an excellent analysis of the legitimacy of the incremental approach, Angel
Rodriguez Luno, Professor of Moral Theology at Rome's Pontifical University of
the Holy Cross, writes, "the absolute personal opposition to abortion on the part
of the lawmaker [must be made] known to all, thus preventing any confusion or
scandal" (see www.priestsforlife.org/articles/02-09-18evangeliumvitae73.htm ).
Leaders in the pro-life movement must, with even greater reason, avoid the
scandal that can unintentionally arise if people think that we are granting moral
legitimacy to even a single abortion.

We are not; we never can. The sad commemoration that comes every January is
a good time to reaffirm that fact.

This column can be found on our website at
http://www.priestsforlife.org/columns/columns2005/05-01-03saddayeachyear.htm

Please remember to support our work at http://priestsforlife.org/donate/


Comments on this column? Email us at mail@priestsforlife.org  Priests for Life, PO Box 141172, Staten
Island, NY 10314; Tel: 888-PFL-3448, 718-980-4400; Fax: 718-980-6515; web: www.priestsforlife.org