the abortion clinic

Today my fellow seminarian Max Pawlowski (named after Maximillion Kolbe, great guy...both of 'em) and I went early to pray in front of the local abortion clinic. We met a lady there who organizes the pro-life efforts in the area and is there every Saturday. I think her name was Jean. She was a complete ball of energy for the pro-life movement, so confidant, and joyful to be there praying and working for the conversion of the mothers who enter there. She told us story after story of women who have been converted, at least for that moment, and turned away from the clinic because of something she or the other protesters said. One lady even came back and informed her that she had decided to keep her baby and adopt another! Jean even said that she's been arrested a couple times and every time she gets out of jail she returns to the clinic and brings the inmates with her after they hear about how the clinic kills children. She was totally inspirational to Max and I.

After talking with Jean some I prayed morning prayer next to the driveway while Max paced back and forth praying his rosary. Then when I was done we knelt down together and prayed a St. Louis de Montfort Rosary. It's like a regular rosary only there are little prayers that introduce and conclude each mystery. There's also a little phrase you add to the middle of each Hail Mary.

For example, today was the Joyful mysteries. So for the first decade we'd start with:
We offer Thee, O Lord Jesus, this firt decade in honor of Thy Incarnation and we ask of Thee, through this mystery and through the intercession of Thy most Holy Mother, a profound humility.
Then in the middle of each Hail Mary we'd say:
And blessed is the fruit of Thy Womb: Jesus incarnate
We'd conclude the decade with:
Grace of the mystery of the Incarnation, come down into our souls and make them truly humble.
There's a different prayer and phrase for each mystery. It was cool. (The whole thing can be found in St. Louis de Montfort's Secret of the Rosary, here or here)
One young lady even knelt down beside Max and joined us in the rosary...that was cool too :) She's in a young adult group that meets monthly to pray the rosary; we gave her our email addresses.

One thing that Jean said struck me. She said many times God allows us to go through trials so that he can put in our face who we need to pray for! She said when she got arrested, "Oh, I guess these officers need prayers!" hehe. I thought that was a good way to look at it. She said one time she told the three escorts working there that she would pray for them. It was two men and a woman. The two men scoffed but the woman said, "My name is Kimberly, you can pray for me" which angered the guys. So now the Holy Spirit has given us a name to pray for. Let us pray for Kimberly.

St. Gianna Beretta Molla, pray for her...and us.