Each of us is sent to serve life, always animated by love. This call to be at the service of life is for all. No Christian is immune from the obligation.
There are many initiatives which serve life in the community. One particularly tangible way this service is manifested is through pregnancy centres.
Pregnancy centres offer free pregnancy tests, practical help by way of material goods, support, and advocacy where required. Some offer access to medical care, ultrasounds, and access to doctors who provide abortion pill reversal.
At Family Life International NZ, our service outreach throughout New Zealand is Gianna’s Choice Pregnancy Options and Support. Through this programme we are able to meet abortion-vulnerable women where they are at, providing them with support in their greatest hour of need.
Reflection
Saint John Paul II, in his encyclical letter Evangelium Vitae, speaks of our duty to be at the service of life.
“We have been sent. For us, being at the service of life is not a boast but rather a duty, born of our awareness of being “God’s own people, that we may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called us out of darkness into his marvellous light” (cf. 1 Pet 2:9). On our journey we are guided and sustained by the law of love: a love which has as its source and model the Son of God made man, who “by dying gave life to the world”.
We have been sent as a people. Everyone has an obligation to be at the service of life. This is a properly “ecclesial” responsibility, which requires concerted and generous action by all the members and by all sectors of the Christian community. This community commitment does not however eliminate or lessen the responsibility of each individual, called by the Lord to “become the neighbour” of everyone: “Go and do likewise” (Lk 10:37).
Together we all sense our duty to preach the Gospel of life, to celebrate it in the Liturgy and in our whole existence, and to serve it with the various programmes and structures which support and promote life.” (#79)
Action
Hold a baby shower with your friends and donate the presents to Gianna’s Choice Pregnancy Options and Support, for use by those girls and women who have chosen life for their babies in difficult circumstances.
Prayer
Prayer for a Pro-Life Pregnancy Center
Lord, we thank You for Your grace in allowing Gianna’s Choice Pregnancy Options and Support to open in our area. We beg Your blessings upon all supporters of this Centre, upon all who help in any way, and especially upon all those who call and/or come to the Centre for help. We ask You to influence these women to choose life for their babies. We ask you to enlighten our advisors on how to individually help and advise each women who comes to the Centre. Lord, we trust You with our lives and with the lives of our family members. We put into Your hands all those who come to Gianna’s Choice Pregnancy Options and Support. May Your holy will be forever done, and may all we do give You glory. Amen.
