Pro-Life Activities Update

Posted 10/25/2022

Pro-Life
Activities
Update

We welcome life at Divine Mercy House! Two healthy and beautiful baby boys, first Khyland was delivered on September 23, weighing in at 7lb 1oz, and then Asaiah on October 6, entering the outside world at 7lb 2oz. Moms and babies are doing well. All of the ladies are either working productively or training for work. And they attend budgeting and parenting classes. The newborns bring our total population in the maternity home to 4 moms, 3 infants, and 1 toddler. Happy (and wonderfully chaotic) Days!

The Baby Bottle Drives for our Divine Mercy House Maternity Home are restarting. We conducted a drive at Our Lady Star of the Sea parish over the past 3 weekends. Their generous donations topped $10,000. Next is our St Joseph's Bottle Drive which runs the weekends of October 23, 30, and November 6. So we need VOLUNTEERS to help pass out and collect Baby Bottles, if you are available to help, please sign up at https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090848aead2fa13-stjosephs

A second collection for our Human Life & Dignity ministry was held during all masses on the weekend of October 8/9. The collection brought in over $2,000! It was a generous showing by our parishioners. Now the Diocese receives 80% of those collections and we get 20%. Never fear, we usually get support from the diocese in excess of $2,000. Last year we received $3,750 from the Diocese for our Divine Mercy House. And we were still able to donate $300 to the Women's Help Center (Pregnancy Resource Center) from our funds...

...and $300 to Catholic Campus Ministry - Jax (serving college students in the Jacksonville area...mostly UNF, JU, and FSCJ) in support of their March for Life Pilgrimage to Washington, DC January 18-22, 2023.
Registration Form
Pilgrimage Payment

On October 1st we held our Life Chain at Planned Parenthood in support of the 40 Days For Life campaign which runs until November 6 at Jacksonville's Planned Parenthood, 5978 Powers Ave. We had 30 pro-life advocates wielding prayers, rosaries, and pro-life signs/messages in the push to end of the evil of abortion. Thanks to Dcn Corky, Greg, John, Susan, Nicole, Lucy, Maribel, Glenn, Brandon, Haily, Amy, Mary, Vi, Elizabeth, Robert, Byran, Susan, Rick, Pauline, Vince, and all those (I forgot to mention here, my apologies) who stood for life at Planned Parenthood in our Life Chain and all who come and stand on other days during the 40 Days For Life.

If you're interested in participating more in the 40 Days For Life campaign, let me know. We need Pro-life advocates to stand and pray 6 days a week (Mondays-Saturdays). Tell me what day (or days) and hour (or hours) you want to stand. I'll make sure you have at least one other pro-life advocate join you and provide a sign if you are interested in holding a sign. At Planned Parenthood so far in the month of October, the Holy Spirit moved me to stand as a witness for 24 hours over a period of 12 days. I observed 157 customers enter, received 418 positive and 46 negative reactions from passersby, and passed out 12 pro-life informational handouts. Again our thanks to all who stand for life at Planned Parenthood or at any of the 3 other abortion clinics in Jacksonville. I invite and encourage all St Joseph pro-lifers to do the same, as their circumstances permit. To culminate our 40 Days for Life campaign, a closing rally is planned for November 4 at Woody’s Bar-B-Q with guest speaker Steve Carlen. Steve is campaign director for 40 Days for Life and author of This is When We Begin to Fight and What to Say When. Steve is the editor of DAY 41 Magazine and co-host of the 40 Days for Life podcast. Steve has spoken on pro-life issues in all 50 states and his work has been featured in media including American Family Radio, EWTN, Relevant Radio, and CBN. Finally, several people expressed to me an interest in riding the bus out to Planned Parenthood on a regular basis, like we did for our Life Chain. I'll raise the issue and see if that is possible, perhaps monthly after our First Saturday 8:00am Mass. Let me know if that interests you or your friends (as I won't be able to justify a bus if only 3 or 4 people are interested).

A number of Grief Counseling/Support Group events are being held through the Grief Share and Red Bird Ministries throughout the Fall season to help

people dealing with losses of loved ones. GriefShare at St. Joseph is every Tuesday until December 6 in the Cody Enrichment Center (upstairs in the Cody Room) Information and registration can be completed online at www.GriefShare.org.

Red Bird Ministries hosted a full day “Loving through Loss” workshop on October 8 for Parents of Loss (who’ve lost a child, from miscarriage to

adulthood). There were 12 participants who were blessed, comforted, and healed by a priest and a Catholic therapist. The feedback was good. Red Bird Ministries is also hosting Grief Group Study for families of child loss (from miscarriage thru adult) every Wednesday through December 14. Please pass the word of these opportunities to anyone you know who is hurting from such a loss. We've been asked to support the Wednesday sessions by providing snacks (fruit, cheese, crackers, cookies) & drinks (bottled water) for the group. However, attendance at these sessions is currently so low that they don't yet need our support. But I thank Kala, John, and Pam (Council of Catholic Women) for standing by to see if attendance picks up and they need our support for future sessions.

VOTE!
The Florida Council of Catholic Bishops has published voting guides for the upcoming elections on the website.
https://flaccb.org/election-materials-and-guidelines
https://flaccb.org/documents/2022/8/2022FCCBVoterGuide.pdf
https://flaccb.org/documents/2020/9/SimplyCatholicElectionGuide.pdf
https://flaccb.org/documents/2022/9/FloridaGubernatorialComparison2022.pdf

AT THE MOVIES
The movie Lifemark was released on September 9. Here's a link to the

trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd48FC5eouI. It is a Pro-life movie about an adopted young man, David Scotton, reuniting with his birth parents, and it's a real tear-jerker. It had a limited release and I couldn't find any local theaters that are still showing the movie. It's not available yet on Netflix or Amazon (the dvd and blu ray are said to be released in December). The movie is based on a true-life story, and a documentary with the actual people involved is also on YouTube, called I Lived On Parker Avenue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pxu6DEPQkw.

Another pro-life movie is Unplanned (2019), and here's a link to the trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBLWpKbC3ww. It's about Abby Johnson, a pro-choice young woman who joins Planned Parenthood as a volunteer in college to help women in crises. She works her way up to counselor and eventually a clinic director for Planned Parenthood, winning the employee of the year award in 2008. Then, in September 2009 she gets called in to help with an abortion procedure, sees the baby in the womb on the ultrasound. She sees the baby fighting against the instruments used by the abortionist just before the child is...(OK, no spoilers here). I was at a couple of ministry meetings in the parish and when I asked who had seen this movie, I was shocked at the number of my fellow Catholics that hadn't seen it. It's not on Netflix, but is available to buy on Amazon if you're personally interested. Perhaps we can sponsor a parish Movie Night to show pro-life movies like these. If anyone has any experience and is interested in organizing such an event, let me know.

SPECIAL NEEDS/FOSTER PARENTING/ADOPTION
Our parish doesn't have a roster of families that have special needs children or

families that have foster or adoptive children. So I'm asking Respect Life Community members that know of such families to have them contact me so we can connect them with ministries or resources to meet their needs. I'd like us to be able to help these families using resources like Camp I Am Special and other outreach that we or another ministry can provide. An organization called CAFO (short for Christian Alliance For Orphans) has been brought to my attention by Kala. I inquired about this organization to our diocese and they gave us permission to find out more about it. A "Stand Sunday" event is coming up in November and at first glance seems to be an initiative to identify people interested in fostering/adopting and to encourage support for fostering/adoption. I've made initial contact with a couple of CAFO regional and local representatives to find out if/how they may fit in with our ministry. I also asked about how they are different from our Catholic Charities Adoption Services. I'll let you know what I find out.

Please share this info with Pro-life family and friends! And if you know of any family or friends that would like to join this community, please let me know.

That's all for now. Thank you for being Pro-LIFE, and God Bless.

--
Paul Munnell
Respect Life Coordinator, St Joseph's Catholic Church
I'm Not Retired, I'm A Professional Pap