2013 March for Life report

I am happy to report that attendance at the 2013 March for Life was up substantially from 2012, which experienced quite an attendance drop from the year before.  Largely the same people, the same parishes, taking this national scourge seriously.  In 2011, I think the crowd was around 9000.  It was hoped to top 10k in 2012, but that did not occur – I think attendance fell to around 7500.  Whether it was the 40th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade that drew more people, or the nice weather, or a special action of Grace, or all three, I don’t know, but the crowd was estimated at around 9000-9500.

Unfortunately, once again, we pretty much witnessed to ourselves. I doubt there were 500 souls wandering through downtown on a Saturday – when downtown Dallas is always dead – who were unattached to the March and saw our actions.  Some of those were the rather strange people one always finds in downtown Dallas – they seemed to find the entire effort rather humorous.

As we left, and drove over the newly covered Woodall Rogers freeway and passed into Uptown, it seemed to me there – Uptown – is where we should march.  I think next year we should start and end at the Cathedral, with the March taking us up McKinney Ave. and into Uptown, where there were many hundreds or thousands of people out and about shopping, eating, pedestrian-ing, etc.  The usual denizens of Uptown, y0ung hipsters who are in all likelihood very worldly and liberal, should be exactly the target audience of the march.  I’m sure my recommendation will fall on deaf ears, but I don’t think the current Roe march is doing much to change hearts and minds.  We’re preaching to the converted.

We did make some signs that focused on contraception, albeit a bit more toned down from what I wanted. I really wanted to do a sign that pointed out the grave sinfulness of contraception, the utterly immorality of it all that paves the way from illicit sexual activity to abortion.  Still, the signs we did do got a number of compliments. In fact, I got stopped by over a dozen people saying……those are really great signs.  I am glad some souls understand the Truth, especially given that probably 2/3 or more of the marchers are Catholics.

This little backpack my wife made for my youngest daughter not only got a bunch of compliments, a number of people stopped to take pictures or videos of it:

As I mentioned, the 40th anniversary of the worst Supreme Court decision in history may have played  a role in the larger crowd.  These Vietnamese Dominicans from Houston (which has a huge Vietnamese population) came up specifically because of the anniversary.  I pray we see them again.  From what I understand, Dallas has by far the largest March for Life in Texas.  Many dioceses don’t do anything, and a number of others have marches that attract only a few hundred.  But since Dallas is the location where Roe v. Wade was first heard in federal court, maybe that makes sense. But I also know the march has grown and been “successful” due to very strong support from the Diocese and Bishop Farrell in particular, along with the First Baptist and other protestant groups that take part. I also saw religious from the Franciscans of the Renewal in Ft. Worth, Sisters of the Holy Familiy of Nazareth, and some I couldn’t identify.  The largest contingent was the group from Houston, which apparently has 103 nuns!  Alleluia!  More like this, please. It is always wonderful to see habited religious out in public – it’s such a rare sight, it’s always a tremendous treat, for me.

I only took one bad shot of the crowd.  It gives you no real sense, but I took it, so I must afflict you with it:

That was at the rally in the parking lot in front of the Earle Cabell courthouse where Roe v. Wade was first heard.  I was not terribly inspired at the rally – Bishop Farrell made about the same comments he has for the past several years, we got a heavy dose of evangelical praise and worship music (I was disedified to see many Catholics rocking out to it), and in general it’s just sort of flat. There were two somewhat interesting speakers, whose names I did not get.  One was a woman who survived several attempted abortions and later abandonment – as an infant – by her drug addicted mom. She was left alone for a week in a seedy trailer. The other was a young pro-life “feminist” who had the following quote: “Feminism is not killing our children so we can compete with men.”  Ouch, but I think that about sums it up.  More on that later, God willing.

It was good to see many friends at the March, including a number of readers of this blog.  I am always heartened to see how strongly many readers are trying to live the Faith.  It is an inspiration.

Oh, for the second year in a row, I did not assist at the “bi-lingual Roe Memorial Mass.”  Went to Mater Dei instead.