The Real Fight for Life
Dear Friends and Benefactors,
Life is a precious and gratuitous gift from God. So, it is not surprising that those who attack God, also attack his gifts. We must fight to defend the gift of life firstly for the honor of God who gave it to us. It is our responsibility to defend His rights, and not for purely human, natural reasons (i.e. in the name of human rights).
That is why if we encourage the faithful to go to the March for life that will take place this year, on Thursday, May 10, in Ottawa, it is still with the conviction that “unless the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it, unless the Lord keep the city, he watcheth in vain that keepeth it” (Ps. 126:1).
It is really the battle of David against Goliath all over again, when we think of the political, Masonic, mediatic and financial forces that support these crimes against God and humanity. Let us remember then the words of David to the giant who despised him:
“Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, which thou hast defied this day, and the Lord will deliver thee into my hand, and I will slay thee, and take away thy head from thee… And all this assembly shall know, that the Lord saveth not with sword and spear: for it is His battle, and He will deliver you into our hands.” (I Kings 17: 45-47)
Therefore, our fight for life is not just about stopping abortion, shutting down clinics, and not just showing the cruel effects on women, men and society. We have to be logical and try to understand and block the different causes that lead to this crime. Why does a woman seek an abortion? Abortion is usually the last link in a logical chain of sins. What stimulates the vice of impurity? Immodesty in clothes (too short, too tight, too provoking); pornography (internet, TV, movies, magazines), impurity and imprudence in dating. This leads to having sexual relations outside of marriage; to use contraceptives in order to avoid its natural consequences (although many contraceptives already cause early abortions). Ultimately, when contraceptives do not work, abortion often follows.
The fight against abortion is really the fight between grace and sin, «between the spirit and the flesh», «between Christ and Belial».
The Church, from its beginnings, has constantly defended life which is given by God, while condemning the crime of abortion. The Greco-Roman world in which Christianity flourished allowed abortion and infanticide. In some parts of the empire, the birth rate was even below zero.
Christians defended the holiness of life based on texts of the Old Testament (the sanctification of Jeremiah in his mother’s womb, for example) and on the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Visitation (which prove that the soul exists right from the moment of conception). In all the centuries that followed we find in the writings of the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers this condemnation of abortion. Saint Basil in a letter of 374 A.D. writes:
«The one who deliberately destroys the fetus she carries must undergo the punishment reserved for murderers, and we do not take into consideration here the distinction between formed and or unformed fetuses», and «those who give drugs causing abortion are murderers themselves, as well as those who take the poison that kills the fetus »
Even today, it is possible to find governments that are trying to reverse this genocide of abortion, those of Poland, Russia and Hungary are contemporary examples. We must believe that our prayers are effective, let us turn to heaven! As I said above, this Thursday, May 10, Ascension Day, there will be a great March for life in Ottawa in front of the Parliament Building.
Thus, as has been done in other districts, especially in France, I ask all our priories to organize in the main
chapels that they serve, where it is possible and as soon as possible, during this month of Mary, a Holy Hour of
reparation for the following intentions:
- In reparation for the abominable crimes of abortion, euthanasia and the corruption of the youth by so many iniquitous means;
- that God may preserve us from other deadly laws;
- to give back to the ecclesiastical authorities the strength and courage to proclaim with clarity the gravity of the sin of abortion and the sanctions that incur those who practise or participate in such acts;
- to create a Catholic political elite capable of repealing existing laws and effectively preventing those in vigor;
- that God may have pity on the mothers who resort to abortion,
- that He may convert them and all those who are accomplice in these heinous crimes.
So, respond generously, dear faithful, to this call to do violence to Heaven (cf. Mt 11:12) and obtain the end of this terrible scourge.
And if sometimes the fight seems lost, if the good God sometimes allows the devil “to wage war on the Saints and defeat them» (Rev. 13: 7), we know that the last word shall belong to the «King of kings and Lord of lords», to Him who is «faithful and true» who at the end will defeat the dragon and his henchmen.
“These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you shall have distress: but have confidence, I have overcome the world” (John 16: 33).
District News
• From April 2 to 6, Father Philippe Marcille came from France to preach the annual retreat to a dozen of our priests in Saint-Césaire.
• I would like to deeply thank all those who have prayed and had masses said for the repose of the soul of my father, André Couture, who died last March 30th, on Good Friday. R.I.P.
