Message from Father Joe

- Home

October 9 respect life Message from Father Joe

Dear Friends:

The Conference of Bishops in the United States dedicates the month of October each year as Respect Life month. The Bishops tell us that “…we are called to cherish, defend, and protect those who are most vulnerable, from the beginning to the end of their lives, and at every point in between, and to reflect more deeply on the dignity of every human life.”
(USCCB Reflect Life Introduction)

Pope Leo XIV recently challenged us to reflect more purposefully on what it means to fully honor human dignity and life:

“I understand the difficulty and the tensions. But I think as I myself have spoken in the past, it’s important to look at many issues that are related to the teachings of the Church. Someone who says, ‘I’m against abortion,’ but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life. Someone who says, ‘I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States,’ I don’t know if that’s pro-life… they are very complex issues and I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them…I would ask first and foremost that they would have respect for one another and that we search together both as human beings as well as Catholics to say that we need to be close to all of these ethical issues. And to find the way forward as a church. The church teaching on each one of those issues is very clear.” (Pope Leo XIV remarks to the press in Rome, September 30,2025)

The Pope is suggesting that we would do well to “reflect more deeply on the dignity of every human life,” asking that we grow in mutual respect and find a way forward as faithful disciples of Christ. What can we do to “reflect more deeply on the dignity of every human life?” Prayer is a starting place. Prayer can help us remember that God’s creative power brings all of creation and each human life within it to existence and fulfillment. This God-given dignity is unalterable. It pre-exists any of our ideas, beliefs, cultures, actions, policies, or laws. It cannot be created or denied by anyone.

The ethical implications challenge our collective social conscience to look beyond the limiting effects of partisanship and zero-sum politics that denigrate or deny the fundamental dignity of others as something good and necessary. Human dignity can never be subjected to, manipulated by, or contained within any social or political cause.

Honoring human dignity in all of its forms may feel merely aspirational or even simply naïve. Yet the Gospel does not ask that we abandon such aspirations in the face of difficulty or misunderstanding. We are called to live with Christian hope, which reveals our trust in a God who remains close to us in our need. We recently heard from the Prophet Habakkuk at Sunday Mass, who sought to reassure the Israelites that divine providence remained even when seemingly absent in the midst of overwhelming social tensions: “For the vision awaits an appointed time; it testifies of the end and does not lie. Though it lingers, wait for it, since it will surely come and will not delay.” (Habbakuk 2:3)

Please join me in setting aside time this month to prayerfully consider the God-given human dignity of all people: your own, that of your friends and family, your fellow citizens, and people around the globe. Together let us pray for the grace to see each person as does God: as a cherished creation, a unique being who is infinitely loved, a divine image-bearer with gifts to contribute to our community and to the common good.

Father Joe Whalen

Considerations for further reflection and prayer:

“We believe that every person is precious, that people are more important than things, and that the measure of every institution is whether it threatens or enhances the life and dignity of the human person.” United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Life and Dignity of the Human Person.

“Our defense of the innocent unborn, for example, needs to be clear, firm and passionate, for at stake is the dignity of a human life, which is always sacred and demands love for each person, regardless of his or her stage of development. Equally sacred, however, are the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery, and every form of rejection. We cannot uphold an ideal of holiness that would ignore injustice in a world where some revel, spend with abandon and live only for the latest consumer goods, even as others look on from afar, living their entire lives in abject poverty.” Pope Francis, Gaudete Et Exsulte.

“As one created in the image of God, each individual human being has the dignity of a person; he or she is not just something, but someone, capable of self-knowledge, self-possession, free self-giving and entering into communion with others. At the same time, each person is called, by grace, to a covenant with the Creator, called to offer him a response of faith and love that no other creature can give in his place. From this supernatural perspective, one can understand the task entrusted to human beings to mature in the ability to love and to contribute to the progress of the world, renewing it in justice and in peace.” Pope Benedict XVI, Message on World Day of Peace, 2007

“Dignity is infringed on the individual level when due regard is not had for values such as freedom, the right to profess one’s religion, physical and mental integrity, the right to essential goods, to life. It is infringed on the social and political level when man cannot exercise his right of participation, or when he is subjected to unjust and unlawful coercion, or submitted to physical or mental torture, etc. […] If the Church is present in the defense of, or in the advancement of human dignity, she does so in line with her mission, which, although it is religious and not social or political, cannot fail to consider man in the entirety of his being.” Pope John Paul II, Address to Latin American Bishops

“The root reason for human dignity lies in man’s call to communion with God. From the very circumstance of his origin man is already invited to converse with God. For man would not exist were he not created by God’s love and constantly preserved by it.” Pope Paul VI, Joy and Hope

“When, furthermore, we consider man's personal dignity from the standpoint of divine revelation, inevitably our estimate of it is incomparably increased. (Humanity) has been ransomed by the blood of Jesus Christ. Grace has made them children and friends of God, and so heirs to eternal glory.” Pope John XXIII, Pacem in Terris

“Whatever is opposed to life itself, such as any type of murder, genocide, abortion, euthanasia or willful self-destruction, whatever violates the integrity of the human person, such as mutilation, torments inflicted on body or mind, attempts to coerce the will itself; whatever insults human dignity, such as subhuman living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery, prostitution, the selling of women and children; as well as disgraceful working conditions, where men are treated as mere tools for profit, rather than as free and responsible persons; all these things and others of their like are infamies indeed.” Gaudium et spes (Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World)

“Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,…All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” United Nations Declaration on Human Rights