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(LifeSiteNews) — A large group of faithful Catholics comes each and every day and sets up a statue of Our Lady of Fatima across the street from Planned Parenthood Fort Myers here in southwest Florida. They know that all graces flow through Our Blessed Mother. The Church has taught for centuries that Mary is Mediatrix and Co-Redemtrix of the human race and the dispenser of all graces. And so, every day at Planned Parenthood, for hours on end, these prayer warriors offer Her their wreaths of Rosaries and flowers of sacrifice as they witness to the innate sanctity of every human life and await Her dispensation of graces.

We sidewalk counselors depend mightily on their prayers. We stand at the edge of the Planned Parenthood driveway as women enter for abortions. Is she pressured? Selfish? Scared? Lied to? There but for the grace of God go I. We desperately want these expectant moms to know that there is a path that leads to life, not destruction. “Do not make a decision you can never undo. God has a plan for you, and abortion isn’t it.” We offer compassion, support, and real help.

It is such a joy, the fruit of prayer and sacrifice, when we can change hearts and minds. Let me share with your some true vignettes:

  • Immigrant parents drive up with their pregnant daughter in the back seat – mom starts crying, daughter visibly scared – they listen, then allow us to call ahead to the pregnancy resource center for an appointment, and off they drive.
  • A 40-year-old woman is worried about pregnancy complications, but she’s headed inside where they will surely push abortion – we redirect her to the pregnancy resource center for a free, medically accurate ultrasound and life-affirming advice.
  • A couple drives out, she having taken the first abortion pill. “It’s not too late to change your mind,” we plead. They listen carefully, then accept our information on abortion pill reversal.
  • A woman pulls out, shaking in tears. God can never forgive me, she says. We console her: “God loves you. He is merciful.” We tell her about the healing ministry of Project Rachel for women who have experienced abortions.
  • A couple in a car stops by to show us their sweet baby in a carseat – they were once headed for abortion, they tell us, but chose life because of our presence.

In countless instances, some remaining hidden to us, Our Lady dispenses Her graces, with us as instruments in Her hands.

The warnings of Fatima

In 1917, Our Lady appeared to three poor shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal. She asked for the consecration of Russia, the First Saturday devotions, daily Rosaries, conversion, and repentance. She told the shepherd children: “More souls go to hell for sins of the flesh than for any other.” Our Lady showed the little children a terrifying vision of hell. The children told of “shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fright.” Our Lady assured them they would go to heaven, so the reason She showed them the infernal abyss was to warn us against it.

These days, many Catholics believe most people are saved. Pope Francis said, “I like to think of an empty hell.” But is this Church teaching? Jesus himself told us, “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.” The Doctors of the Church and great saints also tell us – few are saved:

  • Saint Jerome, Doctor of the Church: “Out of one hundred thousand sinners who continue in sin until death, scarcely one will be saved.”
  • Saint Augustine, Doctor of the Church: “It is certain that few are saved.”
  • St. Philip Neri: “So vast a number of miserable souls perish, and so comparatively few are saved!”

Our Lady also told the children that Russia will spread her errors throughout the world. They had no idea what this meant, but consider this timing: Her last apparition was October 13, 1917; just days later, the Bolsheviks took power in Russia, and Vladimir Lenin introduced Marxist Communism. Russia will spread her errors throughout the world. We generally take this to mean the spread of Communism. Twentieth-century Communism, described by Lepanto Institute’s Michael Hichborn as “the greatest system of control and brutality the world has ever seen,” resulted in the deaths of 100 million people.

But Communism wasn’t the only error Russia would spread throughout the world. In 1920, Russia became the first country to legalize abortion, followed by the rest of the Soviet Union in 1922. As I said, Communism caused the death of 100 million people, an astronomical body count. But according to Human Life International, since 1920, legalized abortion has thus far caused the death of more than 1.3 billion people around the world. What a tremendous “triumph” of the devil.

Abortion in Florida: The killing fields

Florida has become a field of killing, the blood of our littlest brothers and sisters soaking our sandy soil. There have been three and a half million abortions here in Florida since 1973, 84,000 abortions last year alone. On May 1, Florida replaced a 15-week ban with a six-week ban. While this may sound like a big improvement, most abortions are done early on with the abortion pill, and monthly data indicate that abortions have dropped only about 13% or 30% from 84,000 – we’re still at around 60-70,000 abortions a year in our state.

And yet, it could get a whole lot worse. As in nine other states, a radical abortion amendment, Amendment 4, is on the ballot here in Florida, and it would embed unrestricted abortion in our state constitution. The amendment is intentionally vague and deceptive. After “viability,” which is undefined, an undefined “healthcare professional” would be able to approve an abortion for undefined “health” reasons.

A “healthcare professional” can be, according to Florida regulations, even a dental hygienist or tattoo artist – and “health reasons” could mean, physical health – say, a headache – or “emotional health,” or even “financial health.” And so, the amendment will effectively allow abortion up until birth, on par with Cuba and North Korea. All limits would be gone. No longer would parental consent be required for a minor child to get an abortion. Voting yes means voting for abortion at any time, approved by anyone, and without parental consent. And if this amendment becomes part of our constitution, it will be very, very, hard to ever get it repealed. Satan and his murderous earthly accomplices will declare victory, as the voting majority of yet one more state democratically elects to legalize the killing of those with no voice.

Courage, clarity, and charity in communicating Catholic teaching

Our Catholic Church teaches that abortion – in every circumstance – is gravely morally evil. And that includes the so-called “hard cases” – rape, “fetal abnormality,” etc. – because as paragraph 2270 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person – among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.

It’s a sad and alarming fact that professed Catholics have abortions and vote for radical pro-abortion candidates at about the same rate as the general populace. Here in Florida, polling indicates that as many as 53% of self-identified Catholics in Florida are poised to vote for the child-killing amendment. And what have our shepherds been doing?

All along, have we been hearing clear Church teaching from all our bishops and priests on the intrinsic evils of abortion, contraception, IVF, and assisted suicide? Have they been insistent in inviting the millions of Catholics who have committed these mortal sins to true repentance and absolution, so that these women and men may have real healing and don’t die in unrepented sin? Have our bishops been calling pro-abortion politicians to public repentance or else excommunicating them? And now, are our bishops and priests all clearly stating that a vote for an abortion amendment is a vote for the mass murder of children, that we are morally obligated to vote no, and that it’s a mortal sin to knowingly vote for abortion?

We will all be held to account not only for our own salvation, but, to a degree depending on our sphere of influence – as parent, bishop, friend, priest – the salvation of others. It is only just, charitable, and merciful to try to save others from impending eternal damnation, even should we fear that such a message may not always be docilely received. There are deadly eternal consequences for rejecting God and His laws.

Scientific, moral, and legal absolutes

What if you’re talking to non-Catholics or non-believers about abortion? Satan has blinded people to an objective reality: the baby growing in the womb. They incessantly claim “bodily autonomy”: “my body, my choice.” They don’t want you to clarify that there are two bodies, and one of them doesn’t have a choice. Human life begins at conception. That’s a scientific fact, a scientific absolute. And there’s a natural law moral absolute, which is this: it is always wrong to take an innocent human life. “My body, my choice”? Stop dehumanizing the unborn child. Human life begins at conception, and it’s always wrong to take an innocent human life.

There’s also a constitutional argument. Laws permitting abortion are all blatantly unconstitutional. Why? Because all human persons are protected under the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees due process and equal protection to every person. An unborn baby is a human person. There’s a similar clause in our Florida state constitution, Article 1, Section 2, which states, “All natural persons, female and male alike, are equal before the law and have inalienable rights, among which are the right to enjoy and defend life.” Yet incredibly, here we are, right on the cusp of adding to that same constitution an amendment legalizing unrestricted mass child killing. States have no right to deny babies their right to life, because unborn children are constitutionally protected persons. Human rights begin when human life begins.

Our Blessed Mother: Victory over satan and self-divinization

Our world is drenched in darkness and sin: broken families, human trafficking, pornography, sexual perversion, euthanasia, abuse, addiction, suicide, fornication, homosexuality, divorce, bodies mutilated due to gender confusion, a world where a mother will kill her very own child to live as she wishes. Sr. Lucia of Fatima told us through Cardinal Carlo Caffara, “The final battle between God and Satan will be over marriage and the family.” In this final battle, all of this sin is a complete twisting and corrupting of the natural order and the utter renouncing of God. It’s rooted in the prime temptation to which man has fallen from the beginning. “Eat of the fruit of this tree,” said the serpent, “and ye shall be as gods.” Satan wants us to worship ourselves. But self-divinization is the antithesis of the divinization God offers us. Through the grace of the Church’s sacraments, God wants us to claim our noble inheritance, to become “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:4) as His sons and daughters.

And so we are in a ferocious battle against the powers of hell, a battle for our own souls and for the souls of others. The great Marian saint St. Maximilian Kolbe tells us that victory is through Our Blessed Mother. From the beginning, She received from God the power and the mission to crush the head of Satan. He said,

Modern times are dominated by Satan and will be more so in the future. The conflict with hell cannot be engaged by men, even the most clever. The Immaculata alone has from God the promise of victory over Satan. However, assumed into Heaven, the Mother of God now requires our cooperation. She seeks souls who will consecrate themselves entirely to Her, who will become in Her hands effective instruments for the defeat of Satan and the spreading of God’s kingdom upon earth.

It’s a fact that all the answers to the pain, sin, and darkness in the world can be found within the Catholic Church and her Tradition. Natural means just aren’t enough for this spiritual battle: only through the supernatural sanctifying grace of the Church’s sacraments will we have the fortitude to renounce satan and his lies. We all need to get serious about living lives of holiness. This is not an option. This means bare minimum: Holy Mass ideally daily but at least once a week, Confession at least monthly, and daily Rosary. And we need to be helping others attain salvation, so that they are dying in a state of grace rather than in rebellion and unrepentant sin.

We must ask ourselves – I’m also asking to myself here – what more, Lord, what more can I do? Maybe, in these last days before the election, it’s more actively spreading the truth about Amendment 4 and the other state abortion ballot initiatives? Praying and fasting for their defeat? Talking to friends about the objective reality of the baby in the womb and his constitutionally-protected right to life? Educating myself on what the Church really says about abortion, contraception, IVF, and euthanasia? Praying or counseling outside an abortion facility or volunteering at a pregnancy center? Encouraging friends to go to Confession? What more, Lord, can I do, to save babies, to save souls?

At Fatima, Our Blessed Mother warned us of the errors of Russia and eternal damnation and called us to radical conversion and repentance. Russia has spread her deadly errors. But by consecrating ourselves entirely to Her, as St. Maximilian Kolbe says, “we become in Her hands effective instruments for the defeat of Satan and the spreading of God’s kingdom.” Let us go forth with courage and take great comfort in Our Blessed Mother’s promise at Fatima,“In the end, My Immaculate Heart will triumph.” Our Lady of Fatima, Virgin Most Powerful, pray for us!

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