‘Our goal is to make abortion not only illegal, but unthinkable,’ bishop says

WASHINGTON (OSV News) — While continuing to work to change laws to protect the unborn and support pregnant women in need, “we need to redouble our efforts to continue building, in the words of St. John Paul II, ‘a culture of life and a civilization of love,'” Bishop James D. Conley of Lincoln, Neb., said Jan. 22.

“We need to continue to pray and work to change hearts,” he said in his homily at the opening Mass of the annual National Prayer Vigil for Life Jan. 22-23, preceding the March for Life, which takes place Jan. 23 this year.

Jan. 22 is also observed by Catholics in the U.S. as the Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children. The date recalls the U.S. Supreme Court’s Jan. 22, 1973, decisions in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, which legalized abortion.

“As it has often been said that in the end, ‘the measure of a society is how well it treats its weakest members,” Bishop Conley said. “Only God can change hearts, but we know that God listens and answers the prayers of his people.”

The bishop had a special message for the hundreds of young people — from grade school to high school to college — in the congregation of about 6,500, who filled to overflowing the Upper Church of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington.

“My dear young people, you are the pro-life generation,” he said. “I have said to young people in my diocese, young people of your generation, that I firmly believe that 50 years from now, when my generation will have gone to God, your grandchildren will ask you, ‘Is it true that when you were my age, they put children to death in the womb?'”

“Our goal is not only to make abortion illegal. Our goal is to make abortion unthinkable!” he said.

Bishop Conley, the principal celebrant, thanked Bishop Daniel E. Thomas of Toledo, Ohio, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, for inviting him to say the Mass. The concelebrants included three cardinals, 21 bishops and 133 priests. 

The three cardinals were Cardinal Robert E. McElroy of Washington, Cardinal Christophe Pierre, apostolic nuncio to the United States, and Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley, retired archbishop of Boston, who was scheduled to be the celebrant and homilist of the closing Mass of the vigil the following morning.In his words of welcome, Cardinal McElroy thanked the thousands of pilgrims, “especially the young people,” who traveled “far and wide,” to come to pray and witness to the dignity of human life from conception to natural death.

Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori was one of the concelebrants.

Cardinal Pierre read a message from Pope Leo XIV to this year’s March for Life participants. The pope expressed his “heartfelt appreciation” to march participants and his deep gratitude for their “eloquent public witness.”

Quoting his Jan. 9 address to Holy See-accredited diplomats, the pope assured the marchers “of my spiritual closeness as you gather for this eloquent public witness to affirm that ‘the protection of the right to life constitutes the indispensable foundation of every other human right.'”

In his homily, Bishop Conley referenced that papal address to the diplomats, “confirming the importance of abortion as the preeminent priority” and emphasizing that the right to life “the condition for all other human rights.”

“The U.S. bishops also teach that abortion is the preeminent issue of our day for several reasons,” the bishop said, including the fact that it is “a direct and intentional destruction of human life at its most fundamental level.”

“The sheer number of lives lost through abortion, more than a million each year, is catastrophic,” he added. “Imagine if there were over a million murders each year through gun violence? Would we tolerate that?”

Bishop Conley said that the bishops also teach there are other very “grave threats to the life and dignity of the human person, including euthanasia, gun violence, terrorism, the death penalty, and human trafficking.”

“There is also the redefinition of marriage and gender, threats to religious freedom at home and abroad, lack of justice for the poor, the suffering of migrants and refugees, wars and famines around the world, racism, the need for greater access to healthcare and education, care for our common home, and more” he said, quoting the introductory note of the U.S. bishops’ document “Forming Consciences for Catholic Citizenship.”

“But our brothers and sisters in the womb are the most vulnerable and voiceless victims,” Bishop Conley emphasized. “In most other cases of injustice, those who are threatened can speak out for themselves and have at least some powers to defend themselves, some form of advocacy.”

He hailed the fact that the Supreme Court, in its 2022 Dobbs decision, overturned Roe and returned the issue of abortion to lawmakers. He praised voters in his own state of Nebraska for passing a ballot initiative on Nov. 5, 2024, to amend the state constitution to ban elective abortions in the second and third trimesters.

But he lamented the fact that “there are still over a million abortions each year in our country — mostly through chemical and non surgical means.”

Bishop Conley said that “no matter what happens politically, we — as Catholics — must always be here to lovingly serve women and to help them welcome new life,” and one way the Church does that is through the Walking with Moms in Need initiative, through which participating Catholic parishes around the country provide services, support “and accompaniment to vulnerable pregnant and parenting mothers.”

The Church also “does not abandon those who have chosen abortion,” he said. “As pastors, we witness firsthand the wounds women and men endure after ending the life of their child,” he said and pointed to Project Rachel Ministry and its post-abortion outreach.

Bishop Conley said that he has been coming to “this Vigil Mass and to the March for Life, off and on, ever since my days in the seminary, just up the road at Mount St. Mary’s Seminary in Emmitsburg, Maryland.”

“Each year it’s like a shot in the arm to be with so many of you,” he continued, “particularly you young people, who share a passion and joy for the gift of life and who want to build a ‘culture of life and civilization of love,’ where babies are protected in their mother’s womb, and women are, loved and cared for when they find themselves faced with very difficult and life-changing decisions.”

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