Reflection / Sean Gallagher
Lessons in pro-life leadership learned at the March for Life
Students from Lumen Christi Catholic High School in Indianapolis stand on Jan. 20 in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington while participating in the March for Life. (Photo by Sean Gallagher)
For the past 50 years, pro-life advocates of all ages, but especially the young, have come from across the country in January to Washington to take part in the national March for Life. They walked each year with thousands like themselves to the Supreme Court, hoping and praying that unborn children would be safe from harm in their mothers’ wombs.
The dreams of the past 50 years began to be realized last summer when the high court in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization overturned its 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade that legalized abortion across the country.
Many states across the country, including Indiana, soon enacted laws giving legal protection to unborn children. Other states, in contrast, strengthened the legality of abortion in their jurisdictions, going so far as to offer to pay for women from other states to come there to have abortions.
So, clearly, the effort to build up a culture of life where abortion is unthinkable is far from over.
I attended the national March for Life for the first time this year, serving as a chaperone for a group of 25 students from Lumen Christi Catholic High School in Indianapolis, including two of my sons who are enrolled there.
As I took part in the march and reflected on all that happened, I saw lessons in pro-life leadership that led to the historic Dobbs ruling and should guide the continued work of pro-life advocates now and in the years to come.
With thousands taking part in the march and many groups of people, often high school students, college students, seminarians and young adult men and women religious, the teens in the small group from Lumen Christi could easily get separated from each other.
As one of five adult chaperones on the trip, I at times walked at the head of our group, holding up high a Lumen Christi logo so the students behind me could know where they should be.
At times, I would hand off the logo to another chaperone and go to the back of the group, especially when I suspected that some students had fallen behind when other marchers walked in front of them.
At other moments, I would journey alongside some of the young men and women from Lumen Christi as we made our way to the Supreme Court on the packed streets of Washington.
Marching ahead. Walking behind. Journeying beside. Those are all ways of showing leadership in the pro-life movement that has gotten it to this historic moment, where giving legal protection to the unborn is possible.
From the time that Roe legalized abortion across the country in 1973, there were strong pro-life advocates who courageously marched out ahead of others who did not yet know the vital importance of the cause to defend life.
At other times, pro-life people would go to the back and lovingly seek to draw back to the Gospel of life people who might have doubts about the cause or who even disagreed with it.
Still others gave encouragement while they walked beside people who had worked long and hard in the pro-life movement, but were worn down by years of seeing their dreams of a culture of life failing to come to fruition.
Each of us who are missionaries of the Gospel of life in different circumstances in our lives and in our relationships with different people may need to march ahead, go to the back or journey beside.
And the work we do in those places may be very different from the tasks taken up by others.
Before the march, the Lumen Christi group went to Mass at a parish in Rockville, Md. At the end of the Mass, the priest, noting that there were visitors in the church who were going to take part in the march, said that people in his parish were going to pray before the exposed Blessed Sacrament all day for the cause of life.
I also knew that my wife Cindy was at home in Indiana praying and fasting for the group from Lumen Christi, and especially for the young people who are such joyful witnesses of the sanctity of life.
Speakers at the rally before the march came from all walks of life—politicians seeking to pass pro-life laws, Pro Football Hall of Fame member and former Indianapolis Colts head coach Tony Dungy, and actor Jonathan Roumie, who plays Jesus in the TV series “The Chosen.”
Each of us, with our own God-given gifts and talents, can contribute in our own way to the building up a culture of life in our society.
In the wake of Dobbs, that effort needs to continue by people marching out front, walking to the back and journeying alongside others in this great pilgrimage of life.
(Sean Gallagher is a reporter for The Criterion.) †
