The GW Catholics are changing their meaning of “pro-life” this semester.
The organization is launching an “Every Life Matters” movement, extending beyond the topic of abortion to life at all ages to address issues like suicide, euthanasia and body image.
“We started to realize that there’s a misunderstanding about what it means to be pro-life, and a lot of it is our fault in the pro-life movement because we focus almost exclusively on abortion, but it does go beyond to all of the things that you learn about in the gospels,” Junior Chris Crawford, the group’s director of pro-life ministry, said.
The GW Catholics frequently participate in anti-abortion activities on and off campus. The group participated in the March for Life on the National Mall Jan. 25, and prays the rosary once a week outside of the Washington Surgi-Clinic which offers abortion services on F Street.
Crawford hopes that the “Every Life Matters” campaign will spread Catholics’ views among diverse college students.
For the group’s pro-life committee member sophomore Lisa Campbell, the message strikes a personal chord. She said someone close to her experienced an unplanned pregnancy at a young age, and she has seen the child as a blessing, leading her to wish that others will “let those blessings into their lives.”
“I hope we can get a lot more people on campus to see the value of all human life at all stages, whether that’s conception or all the way to natural death when you’re older, to a teenager and a college student, people struggling with suicide and body image issues,” Campbell said.
Though the organization reaches out to the greater D.C. population, the group’s campaign will be primarily focused on GW, hoping to change students’ attitudes toward their initiative by focusing on the cultural rather than political implications.
The group’s “Cupcakes for Life” campaign, in which club members hand out free cupcakes with facts about abortion, will continue this year. But the group plans to implement new methods of outreach as well, delivering food to area homeless and inviting religious liberty speakers to campus.
“The whole goal with all pro-life activity is to create a culture of life where people value life and it starts in your small community, so while we’re here for four years we want to do that on campus, we want to create a culture where people are comfortable, where people feel loved and where people feel like they matter,” Crawford said.
The committee also plans to distribute anti-suicide notes to students, sprinkling cards with positive messages on them across campus.
Junior Christina Longofono, also a member of the group, said she hopes the project will show students that they are loved and will decrease the prevalence of suicide attempts.
“Sometimes you just get so focused on how you’re feeling that you forget about the people around you and how much they love you,” Longofono said. “Being pro-life isn’t just being anti-abortion, it’s about promoting the dignity of every human life.”
While I admire GW Catholics for acknowledging other aspects of a “pro-life” mentality, they should please note that stories like “She said someone close to her experienced an unplanned pregnancy at a young age, and she has seen the child as a blessing, leading her to wish that others will ‘let those blessings into their lives’” do not resonate with the average person. It’s wonderful if an unplanned pregnancy works out, but, more often than not, the mother is unprepared – whether emotionally, financially, or otherwise – for a child.
It’s nice to see an expansion of pro-life to include suicide, euthanasia and body image, as opposed to just an obsession with anti-abortion.
I would really like to see, however, when they talk about suicide, that they address how LGBT youth are at significantly higher risk of taking their own lives. In part because of people like Greg Shaffer and others in their organization who reject sexually diverse young people.
As Christina says in this article, “Being pro-life isn’t just being anti-abortion, it’s about promoting the dignity of every human life.” Listen to your own message, guys!
To say that the Catholic Church “rejects” people purely on the basis of their sexual orientation is a gross violence to the nature of the Church.
This is the Church’s official stance in regard to how to treat homosexuals,
“They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided” (2358).
That doesn’t sound like rejection to me.
1) I didn’t say that the Catholic Church rejects LGBT people, I said “Greg Shaffer and others in their organization,” to which I am speaking from direct personal experience, and from the experience of several of my friends.
2) If we want to talk about the Catholic Church rejecting people on the basis of their sexual orientation, we certainly can. Yes, that is what the Catechism says, but there is a division between those words and reality. One simple example is when the Church expelled the largest national LGBT Catholic organization (Dignity USA) from practicing and meeting on Church grounds simply for being an LGBT affirming organization. Ask LGBT Catholics if they’ve felt rejected from or scorned by the Church, and I assure you the overwhelming response will be, “Yes.”
That being said, there are plenty of amazing, loving, and welcoming Catholics. They’re just overshadowed by those who are not, and it’s a damn shame!
An organization which teaches contrary to the Catechism is by definition, not Catholic.
I mean, it really just comes to what your definition of “affirming” is. That definition will come from your view on sexual relations outside of marriage. To the Church, an organization like Courage International is just as, and even more so, life-affirming than Dignity USA.
Anyway, good morning discussion! Hope you have a great day!
“An organization which teaches contrary to the Catechism is by definition, not Catholic.”
This statement could not be further from the truth the Roman Church claims to profess. A tradition so rich and proud of an immense history would be lost by this definition as the CCC is only 50 years old, a product of the Second Vatican Council. The CCC was promulgated not to be an ‘end all’ rule of life, but to be a resource on particular matters as they were understood 50 years ago.
It is by no mistake that when you chose to quote the Catechism you omitted the section right before it, calling homosexual persons intrinsically disordered. This omission is in itself an example of the type of discrimination LGBT persons face in the Church- you profess to welcome with open arms all of Gods people- but omit the belief that LGBT persons are not fully people properly ordered the way heterosexual people are, exempting them from that welcoming reception.
Fr. Damian, your statement is a major distortion. The catechism says nothing about any person being instrinsically disordered, Rather it says, “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered” and the inclination “is objectively disordered.” (2357-8).
The teaching is the same regarding any form of sin, for all sin is intrinsically disordered and all tendencies towards sin has the potential to move away from God. The Church does not reject anyone, we all have the inclination towards sin.
Just because the Church denies certain actions, that does not mean the church also denies the value and dignity of every human life.
From what I can tell, this ELM movement is the embodiment of the Church’s stance on life and the intrinsic value each one of us has.
The Catholic Church officially condemns homosexual activity, as it does all acts of fornication.
When a group advocates homosexual activity within the Church, leadership cannot endorse it according to policy.
But yes, all persons- though not necessarily their acts or behavior- are to be treated with human dignity, according to those same policies.
Do they include that they are anti-death penalty?
Yes we do!
The point of the Every Life Matters campaign is about reinforcing just that. Gay, straight, man, woman, if you have Trisomy 18, or if you’re neurotypical, if you’ve just been conceived, or if you’re just about to die, your life still matters. It’s about reaching out to people on a human level and saying, “Hey, you matter. Keep on living, because you’re worth it and someone loves you.” ELM isn’t about political rhetoric, it’s about me saying to you, person to person, that you matter.
I am more than ecstatic to hear that!!!
How about the lives of the children that were molested unpunished at the hands of the church that these people support? They may well be alive but they have to live with that for the rest of their lives.
“Pro-life the group’s committee member sophomore Lisa Campbell, the message strikes a personal chord.”
What is that…. that is not a sentence… I’ve read that a good five times to try to make it make sense but I just can’t…
The complete sentence begins before you began your quotation. The error is on your behalf, not the behalf of the editors. If one were to look at the sentence, which you criticized, in its entirety, he or she would easily see that, were it rewritten for simpler minds (such as yours), it would state, “The message strikes a personal chord for the group’s pro-life committee member, sophomore Lisa Campbell.”
Despite what you quoted, the original sentence states:
“For the group’s pro-life committee member sophomore Lisa Campbell, the message strikes a personal chord.”
If anything, the writer unintentionally excluded a comma after the word, “member” but apparently after five re-reads you still couldn’t grasp that. That’s unfortunate.
However, I thank you for appreciating the value of this article’s subject. Oh wait…
No they fixed it after I posted that haha :)
“Pro-choice” and “pro-life” are silly euphemisms. Let’s call a spade a spade and and change the labels to “pro-abortion” and “anti-abortion.”
I am pro-choice but not “pro-abortion.” I don’t think abortions should be the first choice for people, however I don’t believe in banning it because it’s not the government’s place to ban it.
I believe “pro-life” was coined before pro-choice, so if anything, the titles should be “pro-life” and “anti-life”. I hope that’s not offensive to you. Sincerely, an Advocate for Life
Hahahahaha “facts” about abortion. Sure.
NEVER GOING BACK. This group provides no logic and no solutions on abortion. Such a shame to our campus.
There are so many good reasons to oppose abortion. If the right to life is denied in our culture, it is very difficult to avoid other forms of evil such as suicide, euthanasia, self harm, etc.
http://www.tfpstudentaction.org/politically-incorrect/abortion/10-reasons-why-abortion-is-evil.html
I’m gay and gotten more support from both the general and GW Catholic community than from the LGBT Resource Center and Allied and Pride. I thought about committing suicide many times in high school and college, and you wanna know what saved me Blake and Damien? My priests at home, my Catholic friends, and yes Father Greg Shaffer. I’ve gotten more support from them because when I walk into an LGBTQ organization (which I have done many times) I feel like I’m defined by my sexuality, and I’m not. When I walk into GW Catholics I’m proud of who I am, but also happy that I am not defined by my sexuality.
The church says my actions as a gay man are a sin, I accept that because I don’t pick and choose what I want in my religion. The Church says divorce is a mortal sin and you can’t get re-married in the Church if you have one, and yet I don’t see my divorced aunt foaming at the mouth over that. The Church teaches that jacking off and pre-marital sex are also mortal sins, and yet I don’t see every teenage boy crying out in rage. If we chop off every single sin we commit as being frivolous just because we commit it then where do we leave it? So stop trying to be dramatic ass***** and move on, its pathetic and just sad. Life isn’t going to be handed to you with a silver spoon my little princesses. XOXO
@The Ad hominem troll
Simmer down, pup. I sense a great deal of vitriol towards these gentlemen who you brand as prissy drama whores. Remember: It’s not THEIR fault that GOD gave you a itsy bitsy unit that no one, except for maybe your right hand, wants to play with. <3
Look at the pot calling the kettles black. Use your name, coward, and then consider forming a real argument instead of just senseless personal attacks and angry blathering. You talk of crying and rage, yet you’re the only one who seems to be engaged in either. Everyone else here stayed calm, rational, and on point.
Also, ELM is a fine idea. I hope those involved stay Christly and not just Christian. They’re very different.
As someone who has had an abortion I thank god the service was legal, available, safe and affordable. That was 32 years ago. These days should one of my daughters find themselves with an unwanted pregnancy abortion is not easily available and it certainly is not affordable. Thankfully brith control is more readily available. Hopefully the GW Catholic student group is advocating birth control in its pro-life activities.