Catholics respect life in all its stages, from conception through natural death. We cannot pray for life together as a community of disciples because of the pandemic, but we can pray individually through the Novena Prayer for Life. This year you can participate privately for nine days straight or nine weeks in a row. The prayer:
O Mary, bright dawn of the new world, Mother of the living, to you we entrust the cause of life.
Look down, O Mother, upon the vast numbers of babies not allowed to be born, of the poor whose lives are made difficult, of men and women who are victims of brutal violence, of the elderly and the sick who are killed by indifference or out of misguided mercy.
Grant that all who believe in your Son, Jesus, may proclaim the Gospel of life with honesty and love to the people of our time.
Obtain for us the grace to accept that Gospel of life, the joy of celebrating life with gratitude throughout our lives; and the courage to bear witness to it resolutely, to the praise and glory of God, the Creator and lover of life. Amen.