Our Focus
The Respect Life Office seeks to help individuals understand, value, and live out the Catholic vision of human dignity from conception to natural death.
The dignity of others is to be respected in all circumstances…because human beings possess an intrinsic worth. - Fratelli Tutti §213
Overview
The Respect Life Office supports the vision of the Bishop by implementing the Diocesan Pastoral Plan:
- Public Information and Education to deepen understanding of the sanctity of human life and the humanity of unborn children, the moral evil of intentionally killing innocent human beings—whether at the beginning of life or at its end—and the mission of the Church to witness to and serve all human life.
- Pastoral Care for women with problems related to pregnancy; for all who have been involved in abortion; for those who are disabled, sick, and dying, and their families and caregivers; for those who have lost loved ones to violent crime; and for those in prison sentenced to death.
- Public Policy efforts directed to restoring legal protection to the lives of unborn children and those vulnerable to pressures to end their lives by assisted suicide, and to providing morally acceptable alternatives to abortion and assisted suicide.
- Prayer and Worship directed to participation in the sacramental life of the Church and in programs of communal and individual prayer, that the culture of death that surrounds us today will be replaced by a culture of life and love.
