Frank Pavone - Pro-Life Reflections For Every Day

Let it be done to me according to Your word (Lk 1:38).

Pro-Life Reflections For Every Day

Minute Meditations For Every Day Containing A Text From Scripture (Or Other Church Documents), A Reflection, And A Prayer

By

Father Frank Pavone

Illustrated

Catholic Book Publishing Corp.

New Jersey

NIHIL OBSTAT: Rev. Msgr. James M. Cafone, M.A., S.T.D.

Censor Librorum

IMPRIMATUR: = Most Rev. John J. Myers, J.C.D., D.D.

Archbishop of Newark

The Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur are official declarations that a book or a pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained therein that those who have granted the Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur agree with the contents, opinions or statements expressed.

(T-168)

ISBN 978-0-89942-219-0

2009 Catholic Book Publishing Corp., N.J.

www.catholicbookpublishing.com

Contents

Contents

JESUS Christ is Life. To stand with Him is to stand with life and to stand against what-ever destroys life. Being pro-life in our convictions, words, and actions is not merely a personal belief or a political ideology. Pro-life action is not merely a hobby or an extra-curricular activity.

Pro-life is a spirituality, a way of relating to God, an integral dimension of the Christian Gospel. There is, in the end, only one Gospel. It is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the Gospel of Life.

Pro-life Reflections for Every Day is meant to immerse us, day by day, in the spirituality of pro-life. At Priests for Life (also known as Missionaries of the Gospel of Life), we have developed and articulated this spirituality since 1991. It is a spirituality that draws deeply from the lives and teachings of three great pro-life warriors whom I was privileged to know personally and work with in the pro-life arena: Pope John Paul II, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, and Cardinal John OConnor.

It is, moreover, a spirituality that is Biblical, Prophetic, Liturgical, Eucharistic, Ecumenical, and Marian. It is marked by a spirit of joy, a serene confidence, a deep compassion, a radical solidarity with the vulnerable, a strong courage, a constant readiness for public witness, and a passion for justice.

This is the spirit which you will find in these daily meditations, most of which take their starting point from Scripture, and which also draw from Pope John Paul IIs 1995 encyclical, The Gospel of Life, as well as from other documents of the Magisterium, from liturgical texts, and from writings of the saints.

The reflections, moreover, are not just to help us meditate but to inspire us to act. Prayer and action cannot be divorced, and therefore these reflections are as much of an action plan as a teaching, and as much of a commission as a prayer.

And as you pray the Pro-life Reflections for Every Day with me through the course of the year, know that countless pro-life believers are doing the same. Lets pray for each other; lets work together to build a Culture of Life; and lets look forward to the victory!

Fr. Frank Pavone

National Director, Priests for Life

National Pastoral Director,

Rachels Vineyard Ministries

President, National Pro-life Religious Council