These last few days in Rome have
been both difficult and edifying. As leaders come together for the Rome
Life Forum and today's March for Life, there is both a certain sense
of urgency and a shared sense of faith and trust in Our Lord.
There is much to say here - far more than
this space allows. So forgive me as I move much too quickly through a
number of subjects whose unity I'd like to focus on today, even if we
can't get into the depth each deserves.
His Eminence Raymond Cardinal Burke
made a stirring call yesterday for the consecration of the world,
including Russia by name, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the Mother
of Our Lord. Faithful Catholics the world over recognize the formula as
the one given by Our Lady of Fatima if the worst calamities were to be
avoided. It was edifying to see the cardinal set aside the
controversies over previous consecrations of the world, as these are a
distraction and sometimes seem to have an ideological character. In
truth, there is no controversy or ideological nature to doing the will
of God, including the Holy Father's renewing the
consecration of the world to the Immaculate Heart,
and naming Russia as specifically requested by Our Lady. Families
renew their consecrations every year. These were never meant to be a
"once and done" affair, but a complete turning of hearts and minds - a
giving of hearts and minds - to God that marks a permanent shift in the
orientation of our lives.
By giving hearts and minds to God in
consecration, we are spiritually set aside for a special purpose-God's
special purpose in our lives. We set a course toward Him both personally
and for whomever we are given in our spiritual care. Mothers and
fathers do it for their children, bishops do it for their dioceses and
all under their care, and the pope does it for the entire world. We'll
return to this in a moment, keeping in mind the nature of consecration
as an intentional act that sets the consecrated one aside, that opens us
to God's will more completely.
Stay with me as I shift gears here for a bit, before bringing
everything back together. Just before the March for Life we learned
that the Trump Administration had re-enacted and expanded the Mexico
City Policy. You'll recall that this is the policy that was first
created by President Reagan, and that has since been revoked by every
democrat president immediately upon taking office and reinstated by
every republican in the same manner. And let's be clear about this-its
re-instatement is an anti-abortion act, and its revocation is a
pro-abortion act.
Yes, pro-abortion. Not just pro-choice. What the executive order
has done historically is to remove federal funding from groups who
perform and promote abortion-the funding being from a certain set of
funds administered by the State Department under USAID and similar
international aid programs. But the Trump Administration has extended
the order to preclude funding any abortion-promoting groups throughout
all international spending - affecting a pool of money far beyond the
originally limited funds handled by the State Department to all
international funding, extending even into those funds spent by the
Department of Defense. As we learned with
an announcement from the Trump Administration this past week, the amount of funds now containing the abortion exclusion is now over eight billion.
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