Despite heat, faithful turn out for annual Life Chain, Respect Life Mass

St. Andrew the Apostle parishioner Mary Jane Dye of Indianapolis sits in the shade during the Central Indiana Life Chain on Oct. 7 in Indianapolis. Temperatures climbed to 90 degrees on Respect Life Sunday. She and her husband, John, participate in the one-hour Life Chain prayer vigil every year.

By Mary Ann Wyand

Spiritual warfare was hot and tiring work for pro-life supporters in central and southern Indiana on Respect Life Sunday.

Unseasonably warm 90-degree weather distracted many Life Chain participants in Indianapolis, Columbus, Connersville, Greencastle, Greenfield and Terre Haute on Oct. 7 as they prayed for an end to abortion for 60 minutes in the sweltering heat and unpleasant humidity.

But these dedicated Catholic and Protestant prayer warriors came armed with bottles of water, and faithfully continued praying for the conversion of minds and hearts influenced by the culture of death.

Their one-hour prayer vigils in Indiana and during more than 1,200 other Life Chains across the country marked the 20th anniversary of the founding of the national pro-life ministry.

Royce Dunn, director of the national Life Chain organization based in Yuba City, Calif., told The Criterion in a recent telephone interview that millions of people see the Life Chains every year.

He said this ecumenical ministry continues to convert abortion-minded people and save the lives of countless unborn babies year after year.

“God has taken this ministry and grown it across the country,” Dunn said. “We’re marking two decades of volunteers taking the pro-life message to the streets.”

Dunn, a Baptist, said the Life Chain ministry is based on biblical servanthood.

“It is wonderful the extent to which God has used the Life Chain to bring the Baptist preacher alongside the Catholic priest in prayer,” Dunn said. “God hears all our prayers, and that’s what is important. The Catholics have kept the pro-life fire burning even before many of us Protestants discovered [the need to pray for an end to] abortion. It’s humbling to see how God has chosen to use the Life Chain in that regard.”

Central Indiana Life Chain participants in Indianapolis lined up along North Meridian Street and held signs that read “Abortion kills children,” “Abortion harms women,” “Adoption—the loving option,” “Jesus forgives and heals” and “Lord, forgive us and our nation” on Sunday afternoon as hundreds of football fans drove by on their way downtown to watch the Indianapolis Colts and Tampa Bay Buccaneers game at the RCA Dome.

Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary parishioner Rose Kehoe of Indianapolis, a Central Indiana Life Chain committee member, said most Life Chain participants pray privately every day for an end to abortion and greater respect for life.

Life Chains are “a once a year public expression of that prayer before God and members of the public who witness it,” she said. “Our intention is to remind those who see it of the realities of abortion.”

Msgr. Joseph F. Schaedel, vicar general, was the celebrant for the archdiocesan Respect Life Sunday Mass on Oct. 7 at SS. Peter and Paul Cathedral in Indianapolis.

“It is our choices that make us who we are,” he emphasized in his homily. “We can always choose to do the right thing.”

The vicar general said it is comforting to know that many people see helping others as part of their Christian duty.

Jesus expects us to do our Christian duty, he said, and to do it well.

“Christians value life,” Msgr. Schaedel said. “Christians defend life from conception to natural death. This afternoon, we’re out on the street letting people know it. It’s who we are. It’s what we are supposed to do if we want to follow Christ. … Our reward is simply doing the right thing. We do what Jesus asks us to do. … Moral goodness provides its own rewards.”

During the Mass, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton parishioner Steve Hamilton of Carmel, Ind., was honored with the Archbishop Edward T. O’Meara Respect Life Award for distinguished volunteer service to the cause of life in the Archdiocese of Indianapolis and the Lafayette Diocese.

“I want to thank you for recognizing my pro-life activities with this award,” Hamilton said. “It would not have been possible without the support that I have received and the encouragement from my family, especially from my wife, Wanda, who passed away last [year], and from members of our Respect Life ministry at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church. Your acts of pro-life volunteerism always inspire and enrich me.”

Archdiocesan Youth Council president Michael “Mikey” Padilla, a member of St. Bartholomew Parish in Columbus, earned the Our Lady of Guadalupe Pro-Life Youth Award for his outstanding pro-life volunteer service.

He accepted the award on behalf of “all the youth of the archdiocese who are on fire for God’s love … [and] bring great hope to the pro-life movement.”

Quoting Pope John Paul II, he said, “Let us build a world worthy of God.”†