After over a year of uncertainty and unique burdens, the ND Right to Life Executive Board welcomes the student body back to campus. An especially warm welcome to our newest members! Welcome to your Home under the Dome!
We are exceedingly grateful to be able to resume all of our regular club activities, and we invite everyone to engage with ND Right to Life throughout the year. Our first big event will be Life Fest, a fun-filled celebration of the joy of each and every life on Notre Dame’s campus. We are extremely excited to welcome you to Our Lady’s University through food and fellowship.
ND Right to Life is the largest non-academic, student-run club on campus. We work to promote a culture of life through programming, education, service, prayer and dialogue. Our club is committed to ending abortion and the many other violations of human life that plague our nation, such as the death penalty, racial injustice and disregard for people with disabilities and for the elderly. Our mission is to support preborn children and their mothers before and after birth, particularly through our prayer and service opportunities. As the Irish Fighting for Life, we send over 1,000 students, faculty and staff to the March for Life in DC every year. But we have so many more opportunities for service, prayer and activism throughout the year on campus. We’d love for you to join us!
Our service branch is essential to promoting a culture of life and actualizing real change in our community. We offer free on-campus babysitting for the children of Notre Dame graduate students, minister to the elderly residents at Holy Cross Village, host baby showers for local expecting mothers through Project Mom and raise funds for the Moreau College Initiative, a program for incarcerated persons to take courses and receive degrees from Holy Cross College. This year, we are excited to begin working with the Divine Mercy Apostolate, a local educational and spiritual organization, and to partner with Let Them Live, a non-profit dedicated to providing financial assistance to abortion-vulnerable women by raising ten thousand dollars for a woman and preborn child in need. We hope that these programming opportunities offer the campus community a chance to engage with pro-life ideas and discussions in a respectful, charitable and uplifting way.
In addition to service, we love to engage our peers through dialogue and education opportunities. We invite you all to participate in our upcoming academic colloquium on abortion, grab coffee with another student through our event, “Girl Talk: Let’s Talk About Abortion,” watch our annual student debate, or attend the events during our two major programming weeks, Respect Life Week (fall) and You Are Loved Week (spring). This year, we are ecstatic to welcome the Humanae Vitae commission, focusing on Catholic fertility education and resources.
To those who are unsure about our mission and values, we’d love to chat with you! We recognize the complexities and challenges that these conversations present, so we would like to formally invite you to join us in respectful and understanding dialogue as we move into this new year. And to our members, we encourage you to continue to engage in charitable conversations, be a pro-life witness in your words and actions, and rely on Christ radically during the upcoming year.
With the Supreme Court set to hear Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, our mission remains the same. While many may be tempted to retreat into echo chambers of partisanship, complacency, or despair because of potential outcomes, we will continue to encourage honest, fruitful conversations and use this opportunity to reflect on the future of our movement and the state of our culture. Regardless of what’s happening in the courts, the states, campus politics, or social media, we are committed to actively building a culture of life, anchored by the Cross and its radical illustration of love.
ND Right to Life is a Catholic and non-partisan club, so prayer always comes first. From frequent masses to club adoration to praying peacefully outside of South Bend’s unlicensed chemical abortion facility, we constantly strive to root ourselves in prayer and set our intercessions before the feet of Jesus and His mother, Mary. Staying true to our mission, we must continue to acknowledge that every person is made in God’s image and likeness and to treat him or her with the dignity that this truth confers. Mothers, fathers, and children, those on death row, the disabled, the elderly, the incarcerated and the lonely — they need and rely on our continued prayers, witness, and accompaniment.
To the wider community, we encourage you to engage with us, learn what we’re about, and celebrate life with us! We would be honored to work joyfully alongside you, whether you join us in our service endeavors, attend an event or two, or simply say hello! Know that we will be praying for you throughout this exciting new year!
Saint Gianna Molla, pray for us!
If you or a loved one is unexpectedly pregnant, visit the helpline at optionline.org, contact Peggy at ND’s Family Resource Center (mhnatusk@nd.edu), and get access to local pregnancy resource centers at hermichiana.org. There are several Women’s Care Centers in the South Bend area that provide free ultrasounds and other pregnancy related services. See https://frc.nd.edu/pregnancy-
In Christ,
The NDRtL Executive Board, 2021-2022
Mary Biese
director of education, senior
Mary Rice
vice president of programming, junior
Francine Shaft
president, senior
Sean Tehan
director of education, senior
Maggie Murray
vice president of operations, junior
Maura Brennan
vice president of programming, junior
Anna Rehagen
vice president of design, senior
Grace Thilken
vice president of communication, junior
Emma Nowak
director of service, senior
Mary Mueller
director of spirituality, senior
Caeli Jojola
director of dorm outreach, sophomore
Katherine Hill
treasurer, sophomore
Aug. 7
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
