Thursday, January 24, 2008
March for Life 2008
For the first time this year, I attended the March for Life as a chaperone for several youths from the parish where I work. We left early in the morning hoping to attend the youth rally at the Verizon Center, but it was already full when we got there. We later heard that the Verizon Center was full by 8 o'clock in the morning. So, instead we headed to a nearby church which was set up as a satellite location. At the church we attended Mass - celebrated by a priest who is a leader of the pro-life movement in France. It was one of a series of firsts for the teens since it was a Tridentine Mass.
After the Mass we headed to the Mall to eat lunch and then hear the speeches. It was interesting being on the Mall as the crowd was gathering. It's always fun to see how many states are represented and how many colleges are there. As always, the official numbers are disputed and woefully under-reported in the Press - a friend told me that he saw a blurb in the Washington Post that stated there were 2000 people there. However, I think - and several other people said the same - that there seemed to be many more people there than there have been over the last few years. The only unfortunate part of the day was that because the speeches lasted so long and it took us so long to start marching the kids couldn't complete the entire March and had to leave before getting to the Supreme Court so that they could catch the Metro and get home in time for their parents to pick them up. Hopefully next year we'll be able to take them the whole way.
After the Mass we headed to the Mall to eat lunch and then hear the speeches. It was interesting being on the Mall as the crowd was gathering. It's always fun to see how many states are represented and how many colleges are there. As always, the official numbers are disputed and woefully under-reported in the Press - a friend told me that he saw a blurb in the Washington Post that stated there were 2000 people there. However, I think - and several other people said the same - that there seemed to be many more people there than there have been over the last few years. The only unfortunate part of the day was that because the speeches lasted so long and it took us so long to start marching the kids couldn't complete the entire March and had to leave before getting to the Supreme Court so that they could catch the Metro and get home in time for their parents to pick them up. Hopefully next year we'll be able to take them the whole way.
Labels: pro-life
