In March, the Dicastery for Laity, the Family and Life published a pastoral framework to help dioceses begin a synodal process for strengthening and promoting the pastoral care of human life. Titled “Life is Always Good: Initiating Processes for a Pastoral Care of Human Life,” the document was released on the 30th anniversary of St. John Paul II’s landmark encyclical on the dignity of human life, “Evangelium Vitae” (The Gospel of Life).
There are many key practical insights the USCCB offers, which every respect life parish ministry should consider. For example, it stresses the importance of investing in dynamic personal invitations to increase involvement in ministry. The document also emphasizes collaborating with other parish ministries to promote pro-life values interdepartmentally.
Here, I’d like to discuss how pro-life ministry should emphasize personal encounters.
Although it is a good and noble thing to organize diaper drives and collections to help pro-life ministries, it is equally important — especially for youth — that our ministries facilitate personal encounters. For example, one can catechise parishioners on the dignity of those with disabilities, but it is much more transformative to participate in a hands-on project with someone who has Down syndrome. An experience such as this replaces a “diagnosis” with a name and a face.
This is especially true in an age when people increasingly experience the “real world” through digital media, which doesn’t reflect reality at all. People crave authentic encounters, but they often don’t know how to facilitate those encounters on their own. I’d like to highlight just a few experiences that radically impacted my understanding of the dignity of human life over the years.
During the annual workday of the Basilica of St. Joseph Proto-Cathedral’s youth ministry, we offered basic cleaning, yardwork and fellowship for local elderly and disabled shut-ins. At Dreams with Wings, I volunteered with their clients with disabilities to carve dozens of jack o’lanterns for their annual pumpkin stroll at Bellarmine University. With Bethlehem High School‘s respect life club, we made felt blankets for the elderly at Nazareth Home, which we personally delivered. While at Bellarmine, I had the opportunity to hear Sister Helen Prejean’s heartbreaking personal testimony about working with death row inmates.
My high school youth group helped with an after-school program for kids of impoverished families in Marion County. With the Bardstown St. Vincent de Paul ministry, we served the working poor in the client-choice grocery store. With some St. Martin of Tours parishioners, we served food and drink to the homeless, many of whom struggle with mental illness and drug addiction.
With the Helpers of God’s Precious Infants, I’ve prayed rosaries for women and their unborn children as they entered an abortion center early on Saturday mornings. In college, I helped organize donation closets for a local pregnancy resource center to help the women who made a different choice for their child. I now serve on the board of Little Way Pregnancy Center and am blessed to hear the many testimonies of women who chose to parent in spite of tragic and difficult challenges.
These experiences and dozens like them were, for me, an incarnational reality of the church’s teaching. They forced me to encounter, first hand, the dignity of the unborn, the elderly, the disabled, the migrant, the poor, the homeless and those racked with addiction.
Personal experiences drive the development of empathy. The earlier we have these experiences, the greater the impact. The more consistently we have these experiences, the more the dignity of every human life is reinforced holistically as part of our worldview.
Every respect life ministry should sprinkle opportunities for these challenging experiences throughout the year. Combined with personal invitation and collaboration with other parish ministries, this is a winning formula for spreading the Gospel of life effectively.
Stuart Hamilton is the pro-life events coordinator for the Archdiocese of Louisville.
