The Sisters of Life Touch Hearts Through ‘Into Life’ Videos
Patty Knapp/NCRegister.com
The video series "Into Life: Love Changes Everything" was conceived as a response to the confusion of our age over abortion. After a 2020 study, by University of Notre Dame’s McGrath Institute for Church Life, on “How Americans Understand Abortion,” the Sisters of Life, along with national pro-life directors, knew they needed a different approach to the issue.
The original 12-part video series, produced by CampCampo Films, features more than 100 minutes of in-depth interviews. The first five videos air on EWTN Jan. 12 – Jan. 16 at 5:30 PM ET/ 2:30 PM PT.
“Into Life is truly for everyone,” said
Sister Marie Veritas of the Sisters of Life. “Our hope is that every
person who watches it will come to know deeply that their life is a
gift, that they are good, made in God’s image, and that their life has
profound meaning and worth. It is meant to be not only a resource for
pro-life work, but for the whole scope of human relationships — because
it’s ultimately about upholding each other, about listening and
accompaniment, and about affirming the other in their goodness and
worth. It’s about seeing and loving in truth. When we know we’re loved,
we can soar.”
Jess Keating, program director of the McGrath
Institute for Church Life’s Office of Life and Human Dignity at the
University of Notre Dame, says Into Life aims to aid pastoral leaders in their understanding of the Sisters of Life’s pro-life approach.
“Participants
in this course can expect to be introduced to the theological framework
used by the Sisters of Life in their ministry to pregnant women, have
the opportunity to pray and reflect on how a spirituality of life is
manifest in their own lives, and discover what it truly means to walk
with a woman through an unexpected pregnancy,” said Keating, in a press release.
“The goals of the program are to cultivate and deepen a spirituality of
life, to learn about the heart of the pregnant woman — her fears and
her hopes — and to develop practical pastoral skills for effective
listening and accompaniment.”
As the Sisters of Life and the
McGrath Institute worked on the project, emails were sent out to assess
interest. More than 1,000 emails were received back, with responses
coming from parish workers, pro-life counselors, youth group leaders,
catechists, parents and diocesan directors.
“What if we could
take a step back and think about ‘pro-life’ in a different way? This
program invites participants into a new vision of pro-life ministry, one
grounded not in slogans, but in intentional accompaniment,” said
Keating. “Rooted in the wisdom of the Sisters of Life, this series
introduces participants to new ideas for building a culture of life and
solidarity, offers the opportunity for prayer and reflection, and
develops and refines skills for accompanying women through an unexpected
pregnancy.”.
The series explores a range of aspects of
pro-life ministry and accompanying a woman and her unborn child, rooted
in presence and prayer.
The videos underscore the need to allow the woman to talk and fully express her feelings and fears while underlining the dignity of human life and the blessing of adoption and supporting life.
Above all, Sister Virginia Joy says that it’s important not to approach the other person as a task: “I’m agreeing to open my heart and enter into a relationship of love, and to do that I must approach each encounter with an inner state of leisure. … My goal is to leave her with an experience that she has been loved.”
At the root of women’s hesitance can sometimes be a fear of losing her own self or a fear that offering her baby for adoption means she is a bad mother. As Sister Bethany Madonna reflects, “I once read a poem that said, ‘Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.’ As we accompany a pregnant woman, that is our very experience ... she will lay [her dreams] ... at our feet and then ask us to tread softly. This is why it’s so important for us to position ourselves humbly before those we encounter.”
Jacquie Guerra spends Saturday mornings at Women First pregnancy center on Long Island, New York, and often prays at Planned Parenthood. “In this day and age, with so many avenues of information about sexuality, ‘choices,’ pregnancy and abortion, I found the videos to be by far one of the most informative and thoughtful ways to understand the facts and emotions in unplanned pregnancies,” she told the Register. “As the mother of middle- and high-school girls, I’m so glad this resource provides a strong foundation that they need to have before the forces of the outside world can persuade them against protecting life.”
As Sister Virginia Joy says, “It is truly a privileged work to be with another, to sit in their presence so that we may discover with the eyes of God and his grace the goodness he created, the beauty he made, the strength he desires to give, and we will, on our part, rejoice in his gifts.”
