National Prayer Vigil for Life at
the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception
My alarm woke me up at 5:30 this morning and I wanted to press the snooze until I realized that today was not just a normal school day, today I was leaving for the March for Life. I grabbed my last-minute-packed bags, two breakfast burritos and I kiss from my mom and was off to the airport. After a small gate change and dozens of phone calls, the entire group was on Flight 670 from Dallas to Washington’s Regan National Airport.
We arrived at the airport in Washington only to find the terminals packed with Inauguration-goers wanting to leave the city. Literally the first thing I saw was a life-size poser of our new President, Barack Obama. I was, but really shouldn't have been, surprised to see his face on our Metro tickets too, taking us into the city to our stop Union Station. We arrived not prepared for what awaited us: the sounds of sirens, the smell of wet, cold trash, a frigid face-reddening wind and of course more reminders of the previous day's inauguration (street vendors, trash, blockades and dirty water). We bolded the cold, meandered in the streets and took a left into Gonzaga College High School. With its stone walls, manicured lawns and prominent location it looked more a college than a high School to us Texans. We got inside and realized that Jesuit high schools are essentially the same - lounging students, helpful faculty and advertisements for the next Kairos retreat.
At lunch my friend Chris Considine and I realized that Union Station was just as it is named, the union of many people from many different places here in Washington D.C. for many different reasons. Pro-Life groups could easily be spotted by their matching scarves or beanies, in our case a navy blue beanie with "Pro-Life" embroidered in a bold yellow. The looks from the every-day commuters let us know that they were locals.
We boarded bus D6 headed to Georgetown University for the Cardinal O’Connor Conference on Life and arrived a little over an hour later. The city traffic, worsened by hundreds of barricades, made many of the regular routes run late. We caught the end of Dr. Robert George's speech, but stayed around to talk to him after. I asked him why it was important for him to take time out of his teaching schedule at Princeton to come talk to us and his answer, simply elegant "because of the urgency of the matter". With a new, urgent step to our walk, we headed to the campus of Catholic University for the opening mass of the National Prayer Vigil for Life at Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
Although we arrived more than two hours early, we could not secure any coveted pew-space. We settled for an aisle and said a rosary to prepare our hearts. I realized, while watching this aisle, that if I sat there long enough I would have a good chance of seeing the entire Catholic population of the United Stated pass by, and maybe even the Pope! No but really, Chris and I did realize that it is easy to think that being one in thousands is insignificant until you are that one.
Being at the mass I got a feeling, that I had forgotten about since World Youth Day in Sydney, the feeling that as a young Catholic, I was in the right place and that my mission tied me into something much larger than myself. Cardinal Justin Rigali, Archbishop of Philadelphia, urged us to fight for a new change in the nation, from advocacy to a culture that respects life from conception to natural death, saying "this is a change we need and one we can believe in."
We walked back to the Metro with an extra step in our tread due to the refreshingly cool breeze after a very stuffy two and a half hour mass, while becoming very 'close' friends with our fellow Pro-Lifers. The group grabbed a bite to eat and rushed back to our surprisingly warm gym at Gonzaga College HS.
Its 12:30 now, and I'm tired. Oh I almost forgot Gonzaga has school tomorrow, so wake up at 6AM!
