Catholics joined respect life advocates across the country during the past week in marking the anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade decision 32 years ago that legalized abortion.

During a Jan. 23 Mass celebrated as part of the National Prayer Vigil for Life, Cardinal William H. Keeler of Baltimore told a congregation of more than 5,500 people not to give up hope in their efforts to change the country's abortion laws.

"The evil must end. It must end soon. And we are here to affirm that, with God's grace, we must be instruments of its ending," the cardinal said of the U.S. Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade decision 32 years ago that legalized abortion.

His remarks, during his homily at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, were applauded by the overflow congregation. The congregation also applauded the cardinal for saying "the legal protections of our unborn sisters and brothers must be restored" and for noting that "the decisions of the Supreme Court can be changed." Each time the court has reversed a previous decision, he said, "moral outrage was the decisive factor in the change. So it will be in the case of Roe vs. Wade."

Cardinal Keeler pointed to the Dred Scott decision, which legalized slavery in 1857 in all U.S. territories and which later was reversed. He also noted that the 1896 Plessy vs. Ferguson decision's "separate but equal" concept justifying racial segregation was changed; it was overturned by Brown vs. Board of Education in 1954, which desegregated the schools.

The cardinal, who is chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities, was the principal celebrant at the Mass. He was joined by three other cardinals --- Washington Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, Philadelphia Cardinal Justin Rigali and Chicago Cardinal Francis E. George --- as well as 17 bishops and 200 priests.

The Mass traditionally opens the National Prayer Vigil for Life the night before the annual March for Life protesting the Supreme Court's legalization of abortion. March organizer Nellie Gray estimated that 100,000 took part in the Jan. 24 rally and march despite a weekend snowstorm that socked in much of the East Coast and the Midwest with up to two feet of snow.

President George W. Bush, speaking via telephone to March for Life participants, said the federal government is "working to promote a culture of life, to promote compassion for women and their unborn babies."

The president spoke for about five minutes at the beginning of the Jan. 24 rally. "We know that in a culture that does not protect the most dependent," he said, "the handicapped, the elderly, the unloved or (those who are) simply inconvenient become increasingly vulnerable."

Bush pointed to laws passed during his first term in office, including the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act in 2003. Implementation of the law has been held up by three separate federal district courts --- in New York, Nebraska and California --- which have declared it unconstitutional.

Under the measure, "infants who are born despite an attempted abortion are now protected by law," he said to applause. "So are nurses and doctors who refused to be any part of an abortion." And, under the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which he signed into law last April, "prosecutors can now charge those who harm or kill a pregnant woman with harming or killing her unborn child," Bush said.

In an allusion to federal funding for cloning and for stem-cell research, Bush added, "We're also moving ahead in terms of medicine and research to make sure that the gifts of science are consistent with our highest values of freedom, equality, family and human dignity. We will not sanction the creation of life only to destroy it."

The president made his remarks from Camp David in Maryland, but march participants could see the White House from their vantage point during the rally on the Ellipse, with the Washington Monument behind them. The rally preceded their annual march to the Supreme Court building.

Pro-life marches around the U.S. also included the Walk for Life West Coast Jan. 22 in San Francisco, with abortion proponents and opponents coming face to face during part of the walk. And in Los Angeles, the annual archdiocesan Respect Life Mass was celebrated Jan. 22 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angeles was celebrated with Cardinal Roger Mahony presiding (see photo, page 2).

'Pro-choice is anti-choice'

In remarks at the Jan. 23 vigil, Cardinal McCarrick spoke of hope, saying the reasons for it can be found in recent elections and in the "growing popular recognition that the so-called pro-choice movement is aggressively anti-choice" because of its insistence on Catholic hospitals providing abortion-inducing drugs, pregnancy clinics not telling women about their adoption options, and pro-life nominees for appointment to high judicial office not getting a fair hearing by the U.S. Senate.

"Choice is a positive concept, an attractive concept. That's why abortion apologists use it," the cardinal said, "but the way they use it is a lie and, increasingly, Americans are catching on. There is hope in this development."

"Increasingly, Americans are recognizing what a moral evil is embodied in Roe," he said, noting that they are becoming more aware of the "lies that have been spun and fortified to sustain the illusion that abortion is somehow a good, or at least a morally neutral procedure; that it is a standard part of health care and family planning; that it is a proper exercise of a woman's freedom; that it is a solution to intractable social problems."

"It is, of course, none of these things," he continued. "What it is, is an unfettered right to take an innocent, human life --- not on the battlefield, but in the womb. All this more and more Americans are coming to know."

Cardinal Keeler urged those in the congregation to continue their pro-life efforts by writing letters, organizing rallies, volunteering time to pro-life pregnancy centers and supporting the campaigns of pro-life political candidates.

At a 7:30 a.m. Mass Jan. 24 that closed the prayer vigil, Cardinal McCarrick urged the congregation to work to change the country's abortion laws with kindness and gentleness.

He urged them to strive for human rights and the protection of human life but to do so lovingly and by relying on God's strength. Pro-life activists will never change the law or court decisions by themselves, he said, but "only through the Lord's power. That's where we get our hope."

Some members of a group of 40 students from Our Lady of Mercy High School in Fairburn, Ga., just outside of Atlanta, told Catholic News Service Jan. 23 at the shrine that they were more than willing to speak up against abortion.

Malana DeJean, a junior, said just the fact that she was coming to Washington for the march gave her a chance to explain her pro-life views to friends "so they can think about it."

"I know people who've had abortions and regretted it," she said. Her friend, Brennen Linton, a senior, said she also knew people who had abortions and "had not thought about the aftereffects."

---CNS