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Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 8, 2024 / 12:48 pm
At the 51st annual March for Life on Jan. 19, attendees will be offered a range of activities including participation in “Life Fest,” a morning of worship with Mass, music, and testimonies at the D.C. Armory the day of the march in the nation’s capital.
Now in its second year, Life Fest is put on by the Knights of Columbus and the Sisters of Life and offers youth an opportunity to enter into prayer for the unborn on the morning of the march.
The Knights of Columbus is the world’s largest Catholic fraternal organization and has several pro-life initiatives that include support of pregnancy resource centers and maternity homes.
The Sisters of Life is a New York-based religious order with a mission to protect human life.
”[E]very human person is made in God’s image,” Life Fest’s website says, stating that ”our world is crying [to] us for healing” and “Love is the answer.”
“We are at a critical moment in history that demands a new vision. The fall of Roe is not the end. Let’s renew our commitment to love. Let’s be agents of healing in a broken world. We need each other,” the website says.
Life Fest takes place from 6 a.m. to 11 a.m. and opens with the Catholic worship group Damascus Worship.
At 7:30 a.m., attendees will be welcomed by Sister Cora Caeli, SV, and Sister Charity, SV, from the Sisters of Life. Testimonies will be given at that time.
Following the testimonies, there will be Eucharistic adoration. Catholic singer-songwriter Sarah Kroger will be playing music, and more testimonies will follow.
Attendees will also participate in Mass.
Other speakers at the event include Boston archbishop Cardinal Sean O’Malley; Monsignor James Shea, president of the University of Mary; and Sisters Pia Jude and Luca Benedict, identical twins from the Sisters of Life.
The March for Life follows Life Fest with a pro-life rally at noon on the National Mall featuring pro-life speeches and a free live concert. The D.C. Armory is about a 10-minute drive from the National Mall.
Marchers will begin heading toward the steps of Congress at about 1 p.m., starting between 12th and 14th Streets, NW, heading up Constitution Avenue.
The March for Life, which calls itself the world’s “largest annual human rights demonstration,” takes place every year in January to mark the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court case that legalized abortion nationwide.
More than 60 million unborn children have been killed since the court’s ruling in Roe, which was overturned in June 2022 with the Supreme Court’s decision in the Mississippi abortion case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
“The Constitution does not prohibit the citizens of each state from regulating or prohibiting abortion. Roe and Casey arrogated that authority. We now overrule those decisions and return that authority to the people and their elected representatives,” the majority opinion in the case said.
The abortion landscape in the United States has dramatically changed since Roe’s repeal, with many states passing legislation to protect life and others having approved measures to expand abortion.
The theme for this year’s March for Life is “With Every Woman, For Every Child.”
Joseph Bukuras is a journalist at the Catholic News Agency. Joe has prior experience working in state and federal government, in non-profits, and Catholic education. He has contributed to an array of publications and his reporting has been cited by leading news sources, including the New York Times and the Washington Post. He holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from the Catholic University of America. He is based out of the Boston area.
