Midwest March for Life draws crowd

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Participants walk in the second annual Midwest March for Life in Des Moines Jan. 18.

DES MOINES — The second annual Midwest March for Life drew a crowd to the Iowa Capitol on Jan. 18 in spite of frigid temperatures.
Students for Life from Iowa State University joined in the march from the capitol to the Iowa Supreme Court.
“I’m very passionate about the pro-life movement,” said senior Kayla Greiner, of St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in Ames. “It’s my last year so I wanted to do something special.”
Greiner said she and friends did the Midwest March for Life and planned to go to the annual March for Life (Jan. 22) in Washington, D.C.
Sydney Bishop, of St. Theresa Parish in Des Moines, planned to do both as well. Bishop, of Dowling Catholic High School in West Des Moines, said she likes the Midwest march because she knows people there.
Sheryl Schwager, executive director of Johnson County Right to Life in Iowa City, said that she and a group of individuals had planned to attend the March for Life in Des Moines.
“But because of the weather conditions, we didn’t think it was safe to travel there. So as a group we went to the adoration chapel at St. Patrick’s (in Iowa City) to pray for the unborn who have lost their lives and to pray for conversion of hearts to end abortion.”
“I think today, as we talk about this area, we should also look at this whole possibility of adoption,” said Des Moines Bishop Richard Pates at a luncheon following the march. Adoption, he said, is a win-win-win situation for the birth mother, child and adoptive family.
A woman who would give birth and, in love, allow the baby to be adopted, “would be warmed tremendously by the thank you of her child someday, who would say thank you for the courage to give me life and to enjoy the fullness of God’s presence with you and with so many others,” he said.
“I encourage you, as we move forward with right to life, to think of this dimension, that it is a win-win-win for everyone involved and our society is tremendously enhanced because the mother chose to give life,” he concluded.
“Women deserve better than abortion…,” said Jenifer Bowen, executive director of Iowa Right to Life, at the luncheon following the march. Iowa is now down to fewer than 20 abortion clinics in Iowa because prolife people have prayed outside the clinics and said they do not want the clinics in their towns, she added.
(Story provided by The Catholic Mirror, Diocese of Des Moines.)


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