Day 29…Thanks to St. Agnes Parish & our Amazing Volunteers!

Seeing the Suffering…

It seems to me that there are two paths to Jesus that we can take…assuming we are on the path to Jesus in the first place. Most of the world is oblivious to Him, sadly, and are living their lives as best they can, without giving Jesus a thought.

But still…even for the small remnant of us, who know and love Jesus…there are two paths: The first path is one most travelled; the path of comfortable “luke-warmness“. We go to church on Sunday and say our daily prayers. We carefully measure out what we can give to Him each day, so as not to cause an excess of suffering to ourselves.

But then there’s the second path; the path of total self-giving without counting the cost. This path is chosen by very few.

I was inspired to write this reflection after reading the autobiography of St. Theresa of Avila. She lived in 16th century Spain at a time when Christianity was part of the culture. Convents and monasteries were filled. It was not uncommon for young women and men to take vows of obedience, poverty and chastity. A total “self-giving”, right? Well, actually, not so much.

You see, secular life was difficult back then, while religious life offered somewhat of a respite. In fact, the convents had become very comfortable places to live. They had beautiful buildings with nice furniture and decorations. Nuns were permitted to receive visitors and to go out of the convents to visit family and friends. They still said their communal prayers, of course…but in general, life in the convents was comfortable and worldly. This is the life that St. Teresa lived, in the Carmelite convent in Avila until she was 40 years old. It’s not that she was sinning. She was not. But in her own words, she declared that she was lukewarm in her faith, and that if she had continued on that path, she would have ended up in Hell, in a specific place that the devil had prepared for her, which God allowed her to actually visit!

If she would have continued on that path of “comfortable Christianity”…we would have no St. Theresa of Avila. The Carmelite order would not have been reformed. And the saint may even have lost her soul. So, what changed her from the lukewarm Catholic nun, who enjoyed frivolous conversations and vanities…to the spiritual powerhouse and Doctor of the Church that she became?

It was an image of Jesus being scourged, which hung in the chapel of her convent. Although it had always been there, and she had looked upon it numerous times, one day, she looked at it and really SAW it. In that moment, her eyes were opened to the lukewarm life she had been leading, and was ashamed. After this experience, she gave herself totally over to prayer and went on to found 17 tiny convents that lived by the original Carmelite rule, which was extreme poverty and constant prayer. Each house contained 12 women who made a total self-offering to God, by living a life completely given to prayer in very austere settings with no comforts or even any assurance of daily food. In imitation of Jesus’ own disciples, they gave up everything to follow Jesus.

These are the two paths for Christians to take. The first path is one that we choose because we love ourselves. Sure, we love Jesus too…but we love ourselves more. We love our comforts more. We are like the crowds that gather to see Jesus. We want to be healed. We want to be awed by His miracles. We want to be fed by the loaves.

The second path is the one that leads to that “inner circle of intimacy” with Jesus. This is the intimacy that the Apostles and the saints enjoyed. These are the favored souls who get to talk with Jesus, walk with Him, eat with Him, embrace Him, joke with Him, cry with Him. This is the True Path that Christians take if they really love Jesus, more than they love themselves. And this is the path that will attract others to join them. This is the path that will transform the world!

So, how do we get off the path of lukewarmness and onto the path of total self-giving?

Just like St. Theresa, we need to look at the suffering, and allow our hearts to be broken.If we open our eyes and really LOOK at the tiny babies in the womb who are being killed without mercy by abortion, and allow God to break our hearts, as He broke St. Teresa’s heart…we will be transformed. We will finally stop asking God what He can do for us, and we will want to do something for God. We will get out of our own comfort zones and go to suffer with Him and to love with Him.

Keep reading for today’s sidewalk reports…

Cathy & Peggy

We were joined by Mary B this morning in our prayers and witness. Two couples, a mom and her daughter went in, all refusing info. The mom said they were going for birth control for the daughter (age 14 or so). I tried to tell her about abstinence and the dangers of BC, but she told me to stop talking. They came out near the end of our shift, mom did not look happy. A number of others went in but appeared to be workers/volunteers.

A young man offered to hold a sign until he found out we were not paying. He had been told we got paid. 🙄

Cathy & Peg

Julie & Bernie

This morning was very cold but the temperature didn’t prevent young women from coming to Planned Parenthood. One is too many but on a sad note there were actually MANY…. Approximately 9 women accompanied with friends, possibly mothers and some with their boyfriends and a few by themselves. They all seemed robotic and cold, some even laughed at us while they were registering inside. Bernie and I relentlessly but gentle with our words tried to encourage them to speak with us before they made this regretful decision to kill their child. We made sure the 6-week-old baby poster was clear to see hoping this would soften their hearts. Many prayers and literature offered today.

On a positive note one young lady seemed very sweet, smiling but reluctantly to take any information. She went in, I grabbed the poster and Bernie and I hollered in that we don’t judge you, we want to help you, please get an ultrasound. She was ready to go into the second set of the death trap doors after she registered. That’s when I noticed that she glanced at the poster and turned around and exited the doors of Planned Parenthood. She walked away quickly and we didn’t get a chance to talk with her. PLEASE Pray for this young lady that she doesn’t re-schedule her appt and keeps her baby. Bernie yelled out to some employees that came and went that there is an organization to help them quit their job. Thank you for your time reading this. Julie

Elsie

(From Elsie) – Julie & Bernie warned me that this was a high volume killing day at the death mill.  Sadly, more victims continued to enter during this shift.  Especially troubling was a young mom marshaled inside by two adults.  It looked doubtful that she was consenting to this brutalization against her, as well as against her little son or daughter.  So much for “choice.” 😢

Saint Agnes’ Church in North Huntington sent four pro-life stalwarts: David, Charles, and John prayed at least 15 decades of the Rosary and the Divine Mercy prayers, while Anne managed to pray, offer literature, and hold up the big sign showing what we all looked like just 6 weeks after our conceptions.  We were joined from Noon-1 by Ed, who gives up his lunch break to stand up for the least of Jesus’s brethren.

We offered literature to all passers-by, and some accepted it with enthusiasm which gave us hope that they may in the future use it to lead their pregnant friends to genuine, life-saving HELP. 🙏

Chris, Kevin & Judy

(From Chris) – My prayer partner Kevin, from Regina Coeli Parish, was with me today, along with faithful Sidewalk Advocate Judy.  We prayed three Rosaries, a Loreto Litany, and a Chaplet of Divine Mercy.  We felt like we won 2-0 (two positive comments and no negative ones).   God bless every 40 Days for Life prayer warrior and sidewalk advocate.  Let’s have a strong finish to the Spring Campaign.

Nikki & Clare

(From Nikki) – what a blessing it was to stand for life with my young sister in Christ, Clare! She had recently taken Andrew’s Sidewalk Advocates Training, and so I had the privilege of watching her approach the poor post-abortive women with such gentleness and humility, that she actually got brochures into the hands of at least one young woman. It was sad to see at least two families leave, daughter’s accompanied by both parents…having just lost their grandchildren I assume.

But we prayed, and chatted. It was a blessed hour. The first blessing was when a familiar-looking woman stopped and smiled at me, and asked if I remembered her. I told her that I knew her face, but couldn’t remember her name. It was the former PP guard, Stacy! She looked great! She said she is so happy being out of PP! It was nice of her to stop and talk. But the biggest blessing happened when we broke down the materials and carted it up to the Little Lamb. As I was unlocking the door, with the materials all around us, a group of four adolescent kids stopped to talk with us. They were looking at the signs and the fetal models and one of them said, “Are you the ones who protest abortion? Why do you do that?” I answered that we do it because the killing of innocent humans is wrong. One of them then said, “But what if a woman doesn’t want to have a baby?” I told them that if she is pregnant, she already HAS a baby…that it is too late to decide that she doesn’t “want” one. That seemed to sink in. Then they crowded around the fetal models and asked the ages of the various models, and asked when abortion is allowed. I pointed to the second largest one, which is 26 weeks, and told them that in PA, abortion is allowed till 24 weeks. One of the kids said, “That is disgusting!”. And then one of the girls said, “You have changed my mind. Abortion is wrong!”

God is good…all the time!