Saturday, March 13th, we will be treated to a performance at the vigil site by the Our Lady Star of the Sea Starlight Girls’ Choir! From 11 to 12 noon these girls and young women will proudly and beautifully proclaim in song their faith and their support of the right for every human life to be protected from conception to natural death. Come hear them and add your prayers and witness to theirs!

Due to the presence of youth, no graphic signs will be displayed during this hour of vigil and celebration.

The 2010 Lenten 40DFL began yesterday, Wednesday, February 17 (Ash Wednesday).  The turnout was good — our prayer and testimony intense.  Even so, we must stay the course, doing what we individually are able to do, standing with love, empathy, determination, grit, and fortitude against the holocaust.

The online calendar shows a majority of hours remain vacant for the remainder of this week.  Although more hours are filled than are shown on the online calendar, it is most helpful to the success of the campaign if you can PLEASE sign-up online.  This is the only way that we know for sure if an hour is actually covered.  Please invite your friends, neighbors, and all in your circle of influence to log-on and consider signing-up for one or more regular vigil hours during the campaign – Vigil Calendar link.

Because there are many days of uncertain coverage, the banner, prayer chest, memorial, and other items may not be on-site when you arrive.  If this is the case, you can pick up a sign or two from the usual location (call Glenn if you don’t know where this is):

• GETTING IN:  If you don’t know how to get in to obtain the materials – call Glenn.
• SIGNING IN:  When you arrive, please read the Statement of Peace and sign-in… there will be a clipboard.
• SIGNS, ETC:  You can obtain a sign to hold and other materials such as the prayer aids prepared by Jennifer A. (our prayer coordinator).
  • Feel free to take one of the Women Do Regret Abortion/Men Regret Lost Fatherhood signs home with you but do return it at the end of the K40DFL.
  • If no one comes to replace you when you depart, please return all other signs, banners, and other material.
• DONATIONS:  A donation can will also be available.  Donations go to Samuel’s Hand Coalition (SHC) to fund current projects (such as the K40DFL).  Note that currently, while SHC is a legal not-for-profit entity licensed in Washington State, your donations are not tax deductible.

May God bless us all — the unborn babies, mothers, fathers, families, PP workers, community, society, and world we pray for as we do this work.

For life!
Glenn S.
360.329.4985

Lori and I just returned from picking up the venerable green van from its 40 Days for Life station in the parking lot at Holy Trinity.  We stopped for one last time of prayer to close the vigil.  As we prayed the rosary a man in a passing car rolled down his window and braved a cold wind to give us a shouted message as he passed us in the dark.  I could not discern the first part, but he ended with “No one cares a !?&#.” I thought, “How fitting and true his message is!”  THIS is why we stand vigil, because NO ONE CARES for these children – the least of these, our unborn brothers and sisters.  We must pray, fast, stand vigil, sacrifice, work, inform, and educate — UNTIL EVERYONE DOES CARE.

BTW – If you have a sec and want to checkout some really imaginative fiction about the Bremerton vigil, go to the Emily X website and read the October 30th post.  We can only hope when they say, “…some women who need our services don’t come here because they’re intimidated by the protesters.” that women have indeed been deterred by our prayerful presence.

An appropriate metaphor for the pro-life message in this culture of death, the OLSOS Starlight Girls Choir provided a beautiful sound midst the cacophony of traffic in front of the Planned Parenthood abortion facility on Riddell Road in East Bremerton during the closing Victory Rally.

---

Many unborn Kitsap County residents were killed by the savage act of abortion during these past 40 days.  Hundreds of women, spouses, and boyfriends were deceived by Planned Parenthood regarding the true life affirming nature and meaning of human sexuality.  To the best of our knowledge none of the Riddell Road Planned Parenthood staff quit their jobs and joined the ranks of those working to offer true caring assistance to women who perceive their pregnancy as a personal crisis and their unborn children.  As witnessed in Kitsap Sun letters and blogs, and attested to by a lack of positive response to the K40DFL door-hanging campaign, little headway was made in soliciting action from a largely apathetic population that remains blinded by decades of lies and purposeful misinformation.

Where is victory in the midst of this apparent lack of progress?

Victory is first in the fact that those who participated in this great campaign have done the will of God.  We have stood against the tide of death and destruction that continues to rise in our society with every passing day.  And, we have invited our friends and neighbors to stand with us.  We don’t know and can’t know the actual impact of this campaign on the community.  Although we have no confirmation of babies being saved, many of us did witness long conversations and then departures from the PP parking lot on Wednesdays.  And, the statistic stands that about 25% of women scheduled for an abortion do not go through with it when one or more of us stand in prayerful presence at the abortion facility.  We are those who plant the seeds, and bring the water and sunshine to the fields.  For the most part we do not witness the harvest.  Finally, we must always keep in mind that God does not require us to be successful in all we do for Him – instead He requires us only to be faithful.  That we have been!

All of you who have participated in this first ever Autumn Kitsap 40 Days for Life are invited to continue to pray and stand in prayerful vigil for the unborn every Wednesday (the current abortion day) from November 4th through February 17th (Ash Wednesday), when the Spring 2010 Kitsap 40 Days for Life will begin.  Imagine the community impact this one day per week vigil will have if can but pack the Riddell Road right-of-way with the 35 to 40 who participated in the closing Victory Rally!

Thanks to  Mary M’s daughter and son-in-law for this!

TOMORROW — Saturday, October 31st, we will be treated to a performance at the vigil site by the Our Lady Star of the Sea Starlight Girls’ Choir! From 10 to 11 am these young women will proudly and beautifully proclaim their faith in song, in support of the right for every human life to be protected from conception to natural death. Come hear them and add your prayers and witness to theirs!

Although Sunday, November 1st is the actual final day of the K40DFL, this time together will serve as our Vigil Victory Rally Celebration.  We will close with all joining in with the choir in singing all verses of the venerable hymn “Amazing Grace” (sheet of lyrics will be provided).  This hymn, first published in 1779, is by John Newton, a former slave trader and mentor of William Wilberforce, who was instrumental in ending this a travesty of justice of his time.  As we work to end abortion, this modern day injustice and denial of personhood, let us renew this old song as our anthem.

Due to the presence of youth, no graphic signs will be displayed during this hour of vigil and celebration.

Planned Parenthood recently began a blog called “I am EMILY X.” 
Well, woohoo!  Bremerton, WA just made the blog… http://iamemilyx.blogspot.com/ (See the Monday, October 19, 2009 entry)

It is an interesting analogy they make in this blog entry since, with PP as their church, I suppose abortion is a blood sacrifice on the altar of humanist ideology and selfishness to the evil one.

But they seem to forget that, regardless of one’s religion and even who one worships, the act of aborting the life of an unborn human person violates the correct ordering of rights as presented near the beginning of the US Declaration of Independence – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

And, wow!  They must have been looking at the vigil site during one of our busier hours… “Protesters = 15″

Regarding the next post down on the “I am Emily X” blog:  Yes, we do know about the cases where abortion is used as part of the “solution” to incest and rape.  Problem is, abortion solves nothing in these situations; it only makes a devastating situation even worse by killing a human person who had no involvement in the wrong-doing, and heaping guilt on the woman victim.  Bigger problem is that these situations represent less than 1% of all excuses for killing an unborn child… What about the 99%+ where there is NO excuse beside lack of personal responsibility?

UPDATED INFO!

We will be conducting a Door Hanger campaign in the neighborhoods surrounding Planned Parenthood’s Riddell Road location on Thursday, October 22nd & Saturday, October 24th.  Sign up now!

We will go out in groups of at least two per route to provide an educational brochure that details the true anti-life nature of this organization which is causing so much silent damage to our community.  Planned Parenthood has conspired to take the lives of millions innocent and helpless infants in the womb, and has brought depression, tumult, and destruction to so many American families.  It’s time to combat Planned Parenthood’s big money PR machine and get clear and honest educational material to our community.  Doing so will help to rid our community of this diabolical presence that kills and harms rather than supporting and healing.

Monday, October 12th is the 20th day of the K40DFL Autumn Campaign… Can you believe it?

Darius Hardwick (Director of Northwest Regional Operations for the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform) will be the featured speaker at our upcoming  Midway Rally.  Come hear Darius, and rejoice with us that, nationwide, at least 141 babies (i.e., that many that we know about) have been saved from being aborted by our prayer, fasting, and outreach!

Date/time: Monday, October 12th, 7:00-8:30 pm
Location: Fire Station,  7600 Old Military Road NE, East Bremerton (near the Kitsap County Fairgrounds)

Snacks and refreshments will be provided; if you want to bring a pot-luck goodie, please do so, but no hot dishes please.

A couple pro-abortion counter protesters put in several hours on the road frontage opposite the K40DFL vigil site today. We honor them for not being fence-sitters on this issue as so many are.  While dialog was difficult with these two, one of them self identified as an atheist. That being a sincerely held belief, I think we can understand that the killing of the unborn doesn’t seem so unreasonable to such an individual. On the other hand, one would think that basic inalienable rights (Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness) might cause an atheist some pause to reflect a bit further. In any case, we invite all with passion on this issue to come out and join us.  Dialog on this critical issue of our day can only bring light and positive change.