ProLife Liturgical Resources
 ProLife Liturgical Resources is a tool for Catholic priests and clergy of
other denominations who use the liturgical calendar. This application
provides three sets of resources (prayers, bulletin insert, and homily
hints) to assist the clergy to preach, teach, and pray about the pro-life
message with their congregations, based on the readings assigned to each
Sunday in the three-year cycle of the lectionary.
The first of these resources is a set of General Intercessions for the Mass.
These “Prayers of the Faithful” are composed according to the guidelines set
by the Catholic Church, and include a petition for the growth of the culture
of life. This fulfills a request of the Catholic bishops, in their Pastoral
Plan for Pro-life Activities (2001) that “Parishes should include in the
petitions at every Mass a prayer that ours will become a nation that
respects and protects all human life, born and unborn, reflecting a true
culture of life.”
The second of these pro-life resources is a short paragraph that can be
included in the Church bulletin to educate the congregation about the issues
of abortion and euthanasia and to exhort them to take part in pro-life
activities. This paragraph is often drawn from Church documents about
pro-life issues, or statements of particular bishops or the Pope.
The third resource is homily hints. Based on the readings of that particular
Sunday, these hints show the preacher how to bring out the pro-life
dimensions of the readings, and to relate the great Biblical themes of love,
life, justice, and mercy to the problems of abortion, euthanasia, and other
threats to human life and dignity. The hints are not an entire homily, but
rather an illustration of how to make the connections to these issues.
Therefore, the preacher can use this tool whether he wants to create an
entire homily on these themes, or just make a mention of them in the context
of other considerations.
These liturgical resources were all written by Fr. Frank Pavone, National
Director of Priests for Life, based on his experience of preaching about
abortion and euthanasia, and training clergy on dealing with these issues
since 1993. Fr. Pavone serves as a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical
Academy for Life. The resources on this application are provided a couple of
weeks in advance of the Sunday on which they are based. The full set of
resources for all three Sunday cycles, and for Liturgical Feasts that are
sometimes celebrated on Sundays, is found at
www.priestsforlife.org/liturgy.
The
liturgical resources are available via an iPhone app. You
can find it by looking up “pro-life” or “Priests for Life” on the iTunes
store. This app provides the information above for each Sunday of the year,
for all three cycles.
|
