Friends Mary Ellen Hollahan and Amy Bonansinga, both parishioners at Blessed Sacrament Parish in Springfield, heard about the distribution of the abortion pill and decided not only to pray for the discontinuation of its use, but to ask others to join them. A member of Right to Life provided them with some direction and the Social Concerns office became involved, too.
“I think Amy and I were kind of naïve about how to go about this,” said Hollahan. “At first we were just going to hand out some fliers. Thanks be to God, Right to Life and the people at the diocese were there to help us (as co-sponsors.).”
Because Hollahan has four children and Bonansinga has six children, the two mothers knew that someone would have to mind the youngsters while they and other young women spent the day at the vigil. They organized a babysitting co-op, with mothers either watching the children at Bonansinga’s home or spending some time at the vigil.
“I know there are a lot of people who aren’t happy about Planned Parenthood distributing RU-486. Overall, the day went very well. Nothing confrontational happened and we got a lot of people honking horns in support of us,” Hollahan said. “The positive reactions far outweighed the negative.”
Hollahan said that although people were asked to sign up for half-hour shifts, a number of people were there for much longer. “We had people who came out and spent hours there praying — and it was cold so I know they were getting chilly. Sometimes we had 5 to 10 people gathered at a time and sometimes it was closer to 20.
“We had people of all ages there. We had some eighth-graders from Blessed Sacrament who didn’t go to Washington, D.C., and we had some retired people. There was a group from Catholic Charities and we had people from the Marian Center who were covering shifts for each other so they could take turns praying,” Hollahan said.
“We also had a group from Calvary Church and at least one woman who was a Methodist who came here from Thayer. I know there were people who were in Washington who would have come if they had been in Springfield.”
Hollahan said she believes there will be other organized vigils but invites individuals to keep praying for life. “Our motivation is always to pray,” she said. “We all have the right to go down there and pray at any time.”