Day 15: National Campaign Director in Town This Thursday/Friday!

In his encyclical letter, The Gospel of Life, Pope John Paul II recalls the first murder in the Biblical account of Cain and Abel. In this ancient story, we see elements that have not changed over thousands of years. These elements include anger, envy, lack of self-control, and afterwards fear and shame.

Cain tries to cover up his crime with a lie ["I do not know" (Gen. 4:9)]. This was and still is the case, when all kinds of ideologies try to justify and disguise the most atrocious crimes against human beings (para. 8).

Well before Sigmund Freud, the writer of Genesis was aware of the concept of denial. This dynamic makes it hard to deal with people contemplating abortion, who have had abortions, or who were complicit with them. Cain shows us a first and basic type of denial -- denial of fact. Another type, also common, is denial of responsibility: "I had no choice" or "it wasn't my fault." Another, denial of impact: "It was just a blob of tissue" or "it would have had a terrible life anyway."

Although we cannot know the motives for advocates of abortion, we know how to respond: pray, fast and love. Denial is conquered by fidelity to truth. Let's all stand with the truth by attending the vigil or participating in our Saturday outreach!

On another note, our national campaign director, Shawn Carney, will be in town this Thursday and Friday. I'm hoping to attend both events, and I hope you'll be able to join me! Event details follow for both Thursday and Friday:

Thursday, March 24
8:00 PM
Our Lady of Victory Hess Auditorium, 4835 MacArthur Blvd. NW, Washington, DC

On Friday, Shawn will be attending a Manassas vigil filming event. Here is the note from Tim:

I just received confirmation that Shawn Carney, Campaign Director for 40 Days for Life, and a film crew from the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) will be at our prayer vigil site at about 12:00 pm this Friday, March 25. My understanding is that CBN wants to film a local campaign, and we've been selected! If you can make it out to the prayer vigil this Friday, please do. Currently, we only have one prayer volunteer signed up for the 12:00 pm hour! [Sign up at www.40daysforlife.com/manassas] --Tim Jackson, Campaign Director, 40 Days for Life-Manassas Building a culture of life, one prayer at a time

Finally, we have a note from Zoe, one of our 40 days participants, who offers a heart-felt meditation on the sorrow caused by abortion:

How sad it is that a mother or father of a preborn child through ignorance and desperation would believe that with all the billions of people on this Earth already and all the love, and sky, trees, stars, etc. … that there would not be room for their own child here.

They may think their parents will be so disappointed in them or that they need to finish college… what they don’t fully realize is that... they can never get that baby back and how badly they will always want to go back in the past... they will almost always feel the guilt and the emptiness... as if they had ate the apple in the Garden of Eden... People need to realize once they conceive, they become parents. And a parent's first responsibility is ALWAYS to their child.

Thanks, Zoe, for sharing your thoughts and comments with us! Please remember to send news and stories from the campaign front to Jacinta Whittaker at jacinta.40days@gmail.com. We'd love to hear from you!