Several months ago, I was praying the rosary with a group of Providence College students outside the Planned Parenthood Clinic in downtown Providence. Sometime in the middle of the rosary - I think that we were praying the third sorrowful mystery - a car pulled up alongside us. The driver - a woman - showed us an obscene gesture before driving off. That incident prompted a short discussion among my students who wondered about the nature of the abortion debate today. Why is it so strident? Why is it so full of anger? Why is the debate apparently irreconcilable?

Today is Respect for Life Sunday. Once again, the Church invites us to reflect upon the truth that the human person in all his beauty and his dignity should be respected and protected from the moment he comes into this world at conception until he leaves to return to the Father's house. Later this month, a conference will be held at Princeton University entitled "Open Hearts, Open Minds and Fair Minded Words." At that conference, scholars, politicians and activists from both sides of the abortion debate will come together, once again, to seek some common ground. This morning, I would like us to reflect on the questions raised by my students on that sidewalk some months ago. Why is the debate so strident? Why is the debate so full of anger? I would also like us to consider how we as Catholic Christians are called to work to heal this great wound at the heart of our nation.

For me, my understanding of the abortion debate was radically changed when I met a woman who came through me through Project Rachel. I am not sure if you know about Project Rachel. Project Rachel is the Catholic Church's ministry to women and men who are suffering from the aftereffects of abortion. It was a privilege for me to have been trained as a Project Rachel priest while I was still a seminarian in Washington, D.C. This woman had had an abortion twenty-seven years prior to our meeting. She had never spoken about it since. She did not tell her husband. She did not tell her children. She simply carried her secret burden in her heart. But after twenty-seven years of depression twice a year, on the anniversary of the abortion and on the anniversary of her due date, and difficulties even walking down a supermarket aisle filled with Pampers, she had decided that she needed to talk about the secret tragedy in her past.

Until our conversations, I had assumed that the abortion debate was a matter of argumentation and evidence. I had assumed that healing the debate simply meant coming up with a better argument to support the pro-life claim. But this woman changed my mind and my heart. As she pointed out, she had heard all the pro-life arguments for years, but they simply went in one ear and out the other. "Why?" I asked her. "Why did you not hear them?" "Don't you get it, Father?" she responded. "I could not hear them. I could not even admit that they were plausible. I could not even open the door a crack to let them in, because if I did, I would have to admit that I had killed my child. And I could never do that! I could never live with that burden and guilt. And so, I simply closed my ears. In fact, I perceived these arguments as attacks on my happiness and my integrity, and so I lashed back." "The only reason I can even talk about my abortion with you today," she continued, "is because right after admitting that I had killed my child, I could go to confession and be assured of God's forgiveness."

Pope John Paul II wrote a great encyclical - a papal letter - some years ago called Evangelium vitae, the Gospel of Life. It is not a short letter - anyone who has read the Holy Father's letters knows that they are never short - and it is over a hundred paragraphs long. I believe that the most important paragraph in that papal letter - and there are many important paragraphs in that letter - is paragraph 99. In that paragraph, the Holy Father directly addresses women who have had abortions. In that paragraph, the Pope tells these women that the Church is aware that the decision to choose an abortion is often made in tragic circumstances. It is a time of great anxiety and stress, with pressure from parents, from the father of the child, and from the grief of lost dreams. The so-called choice that ends in tragedy is rarely free. And yet, the Holy Father, goes on, we should never forget that God is a Father of Mercies, who is always waiting to forgive, twenty, thirty, or even in one case I have encountered, sixty years after the abortion. The path to healing is always open to those who seek mercy and love.

In today's second reading, the Apostle Paul reminds Timothy, that he needs to speak the truth with power, courage, and strength, knowing that he does so with the grace of God. Today, on Respect for Life Sunday, we are challenged once again to speak up for life, also with power, courage, and strength. However, we must do this gently and with patient understanding. We must do this with great compassion and mercy, fully aware of the pain and the sorrow that often lies hidden behind the strident words and the obscene gestures. We must do this with the love of Christ who alone can heal the deepest wounds of the human heart. We do this by speaking to our politicians and by providing cogent arguments to our judges. We do this by voting to change our culture. However, as Catholic Christians, we have the added responsibility and privilege of doing one more thing - the most important thing - that will bring healing and peace to our land. And this we must do this every day no matter what. We must pray.