All it takes is a simple “YES”

I first joined the 40 Days for Life vigil three years ago, just after graduating. I had more time, but more than that, I had a growing desire to live my faith more intentionally. A friend invited me to one of the initial pro-life events, and from the moment I arrived. It didn’t feel forced or unfamiliar it felt like I had stepped..... into something I was meant to be part of.

At that time, my prayer life was very active. I was praying multiple rosaries a day and had a strong desire to be bold in my faith. I’ve always been someone who is drawn to challenges, and this felt like a spiritual one something that would stretch me, but also root me more deeply in Christ. So I said “yes.”

Now, three years later, I can say that each year has been completely different. The first year was new and unfamiliar. The second brought more understanding. And this third year has felt more grounded I’ve noticed that I’m less affected by what people say. That doesn’t mean it has been easy. There have been moments of what I can only describe as spiritual warfare, where before anything good seemed to happen, there would be accusations and hurtful words. Some people would film us or call us names. Yet, after these moments, there was also visible good fruit especially in seeing many young people becoming open to receiving rosaries. What started with resistance would sometimes completely shift, with hearts opening in ways we didn’t expect, and that was a powerful reminder of God at work.

But over time, I’ve learned something important: not every word spoken over you is truth. One of the most powerful things I began to practice was consciously rejecting those lies in prayer renouncing them in the name of Jesus. That shift has been transformative. It not only changed how I experienced the vigil, but also how I approach challenges in daily life.

Another thing I’ve come to appreciate is the different ways people serve during the vigil. Some prefer to pray the rosary continuously, others stand in quiet prayer, and some engage by offering leaflets and sacramentals. Over the years, I’ve learned the beauty of this balance how each role matters and contributes to the overall presence.

This year, however, something shifted for me personally. I felt a clear prompting from the Lord to step out and offer rosaries to people passing by. It wasn’t something I had planned it just grew naturally. I found myself going beyond my usual commitment, coming on extra days!

What stood out most was the response. In the first few days, every single rosary we gave was taken. After this, while many people declined or responded negatively, some were genuinely touched. Some would ask, almost surprised, “Is this really for me? For free?” And in those moments, something deeper was happening.

It became clear to me that this was more than just a pro-life witness it was also about encountering people where they are. These small interactions, even just a few seconds long, had the potential to reach someone’s heart.

During a time of prayer and Adoration, I had a moment that has stayed with me deeply. We were reflecting on how God sees us individually, and I had a strong sense of being seen as a child completely known and loved. I even had a brief image of myself as a baby. That moment connected so powerfully with the mission I was part of. It reminded me that every life begins like that small, vulnerable, yet deeply precious and fully seen by God.

That realisation strengthened my conviction. If God sees each of us with such care and intention, then every life truly matters “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” - Jeremiah 29:11  

This year in Ealing, I’ve seen a range of responses some people uninterested, some opposed, but many open in quiet and unexpected ways. And those moments of openness are enough. They remind me that this mission is not about forcing anything, but about offering something with love, gentleness, and dignity.

For me, these three years have been a journey of growth not just in action, but in understanding. Learning to stand firm, to remain peaceful, and to trust that even the smallest act whether a prayer, a rosary, or a brief encounter can carry lasting impact. Sometimes, all it takes is a simple “yes.”

Riona

To sign up for hours at the 40 Days for Life vigil in Ealing, West London contact Sarah on 07776256838, or email her at london40daysforlife@hotmail.com

The 40 Days for Life Prayer Vigil in Brixton will run for 12 hours a day, 8am to 8pm, seven days a week from Ash Wednesday until Palm Sunday. If you could spare an hour or more to come and pray with us, it would be of great help. The vigil takes place at the corner of Brixton Water Lane, London, SW2 5BJ. For more details or to book to attend please contact Gabriella on 07745711064 or 02077231740

For details about 40 Days for Life Prayer Vigils in Reading, Southend, Liverpool, Nottingham, Glasgow, Leicester, Bournemouth and Sheffield see here and for the rest of the World see here 

Saving Lives This Lent

During Lent we often struggle with Prayer, Fasting and Almsgiving. Yet these Lenten duties aren’t given to us as a punishment but as a means to help us overcome our own spiritual weakness, our greed and selfishness and even our lack of self-control and our lack of vigour in attaining holiness. In other words, Lent is a kind of spiritual workout for the soul. It can be hard sometimes to feel that giving up chocolate and saying an extra prayer or two is making much difference. Sometimes it is even harder to just keep doing the penances or spiritual extras we have taken on, or knowing where best to give alms!

Pro-life work provides an opportunity for all these things. Firstly, in order to try to help women considering abortion, we have to have hope ourselves – abortion is an act of despair, so if we don’t have hope, we have nothing to offer women in need. So we need to keep our own faith alive and active through a deep prayer life. Secondly, some demons can only be cast out through prayer and fasting, as Our Lord told the apostles. And sometimes it is very clear that abortion is one of the issues that requires both prayer and fasting for us to overcome it. Finally, almsgiving. The women we see come to us with every kind of problem: homelessness, trafficking, abuse, illegal immigration, poverty, drug and alcohol addiction, imprisonment, prostitution, depression, marriage breakdown, and so many other difficult situations. Money is not the answer to every problem, but money can often buy help, keep food on the table and a roof over someone’s head. With your support, we can reach and help many more Mothers, so they can choose life and we can support them as they do so.

The women who choose abortion come from every walk of life, rich and poor, black and white and every race and colour. We can use Lent to profit our own soul as well as to help save the lives of others by deepening our prayer, fasting and almsgiving for those tempted to abort.

A young Mother, Joanna, who we helped recently, changed her mind as she was going to the Ealing abortion centre. The thing that made her feel able to choose life was our offer to help with part of her rent for the months she would be off work because she did not qualify for maternity pay. That promise has been honoured and she is now the delighted Mother of Jennifer, who is the apple of her eye. It’s amazing that a relatively small amount of financial help can save a life, but it is true! Not just has it saved Jennifer’s life, but it has also brought Joanna to the point where she recognises that abortion would have been wrong, and a terrible mistake. Something she would never want to consider again, no matter how difficult the circumstances.

So, this Lent, please join us and spare some prayer, fasting and almsgiving for the pro-life movement.

Prayer

Why not join us in prayer during Lent? See the options to join our Rosary or Adoration Rotas, or join us at 40 Days for Life – see GoodCounselNetwork.com for details. And follow the daily updates here on our blog, which includes details of the Bishop, Archbishop and Cardinal who have attended 40 Days for Life vigils in London this Lent.

Fasting

Can you offer your fasting and any suffering you have for the end of abortion, the closure of abortion centres and for particular Mothers considering abortion?

Almsgiving

Can you support our work and help the Mothers we are assisting by donating during Lent? Or could you start making a regular (e.g. monthly) donation to our work? See our bank details below.

Clare

DONATE TO SUPPORT OUR WORK

Donate by Bank Transfer to:

The Guild of Our Lady of Good Counsel

Sort Code: 40-06-30                       

Account Number: 13994678

By Credit Card over the phone:

Call 0207-723-1740

Monday to Friday, 10.30-6pm

Via Paypal: Paypal.me/SaveLivesGCN

Eucharistic Adoration: The Way to End Abortion

 

           The Eucharist is the focal point of the Catholic faith because it is Jesus present with us here on earth today. In the Eucharist, Jesus prolongs His presence on earth and most completely fulfils His words: “Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world” (Mt. 28:20)

            The Eucharist is Jesus’ greatest expression of His love for us. Jesus expresses His love for us in three ways in the Eucharist: by re-presenting His sacrifice of the Cross in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, by uniting His life with ours in Holy Communion, and by giving us the gift of continual presence in the Blessed Sacrament. This is another way of saying that the Eucharist is a threefold sacrament, i.e,. it confers grace in three different ways. We will focus here on the third way. Prayer before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is efficacious, and it is the way to secure the graces necessary to put an end to abortion in the world. Mother Teresa of Calcutta said, “ If people spent an hour a week in Eucharistic adoration, abortion would be ended.”

            Of the many graces received by prayer before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, the greatest by far is the sanctification of the adorer. Young people should be encouraged to spend time before our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. In that way they will fortify themselves against temptations against chastity, which when succumbed to, often lead to the sin of abortion.

            Pope Paul VI said that Eucharistic adoration cultivates in the soul “a ‘social’ love by which the common good is given preference over the good of the individual.” This heightened social conscience makes one more aware of the immense dignity of every human person; it allows one to see clearly that every human person is uniquely created and specially loved by God. Such a sensitised conscience finds abortion abhorrent and could never hold a “pro-choice” position.

            Pope John Paul II, in a recent letter commemorating the 750^th anniversary of the first celebration of the feast of Corpus Christi, said, “through adoration the Christian mysteriously contributes to the radical transformation of the world.” This is a powerful statement that affirms the awesome power of Eucharistic adoration, the power that will transform our “culture of death” into a culture of life. Eucharistic adoration is the most powerful means one can employ to win graces for the conversion and salvation of those involved in abortion and other sins against human life. Blessed Dina Belanger was told by Jesus in a vision that a multitude of souls were saved from the fires of hell by her Eucharistic holy hours of prayer.

           

The heart of the apostolate of every pro-life worker should be a weekly Eucharistic holy hour dedicated specifically to the end of contraception, abortion and euthanasia throughout the world. It is necessary to pray first for the end of contraception because abortion and euthanasia are logical and natural consequences of contraception. If man dares to usurp God’s prerogative and determine when life begins, it follows that he will also dare to determine when it ends.

            Putting an end to abortion is just one of many reasons why every parish should have perpetual Eucharistic adoration. Perpetual Eucharistic adoration is the “devotion of devotions.” It provides an easy and convenient means for everyone in the parish to spend at least an hour a week with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. I urge all Catholic pro-lifers to encourage their pastors to start perpetual adoration in their parishes.

[Sign up to commit to an hour of Adoration of the most Blessed Sacrament for the work of the Good Counsel Network, once a week. You can fulfil this in any Church of your choice.]

© Rev. Victor P. Warkulwiz, M.S.S., National Director of the Apostolate for Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration. For more information contact:

APOSTOLATE FOR PERPETUAL EUCHARISTIC ADORATION

MISSIONARY PRIESTS OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT

P.O. BOX 1428, BENSALEM, PA 19020, USA.    PH:215.244.9211   FAX: 215.244.9211

E-MAIL: apea@webtv.net 

Prayer, Adoration, Lock-down and Abortion

Saint Teresa of Calcutta said “If people spend one hour per week in Eucharistic Adoration, abortion would be ended”. Just think about that for a moment, “abortion would be ended”. Somewhere in the region of 200,000 lives would be saved every year in the UK alone.

Jesus Christ is truly present in The Blessed Sacrament and we receive Him, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity at Mass and we can really Adore Him in the Monstrance at Adoration. If we spend time praying in the physical presence of God is it any wonder that Saint Teresa said “abortion would be ended”.  Before the lock-down started we would have Eucharistic Adoration five days a week in The Good Counsel Network’s Chapel. We have now missed over 200 hours of Adoration. Thousands, maybe tens of thousands of hours of Adoration have been missed in Churches up and down the country. It is good that people are finding ways to pray online, live streamed Masses, Adoration, retreats etc. But it is not the same, it is a bit like the difference between going to visit your family and talking to them on the phone or online. We need real contact; we need to Adore God in the Blessed Sacrament.

We all have things we are waiting to see re-open as lock-down is relaxed. My wife, son and myself  have spent a bit of time in the book shops now they have re-opened. I will ‘waste’ some time watching football in due course, (according to my wife). This is all good and well and I trust you can add to the list for yourself. But let us remember that this will not end abortion. So let us be clear with a plan now, such as. ‘Now churches are re-opening, I will go and spend an hour a week in Eucharistic Adoration and if no parish near me has Adoration I will pray in front of the Tabernacle, knowing that Jesus Christ is there.’ If you have been unable to get to Confession during lock-down, go before public Masses start up again (many priests are now offering it on request).

Abortion centres have remained open during lock-down and the government have unbelievably allowed D.I.Y. abortions at home, with the abortion centres posting abortion pills to women they have never even met or examined. The abortion figures for last year are the worst on record, the even easier availability of home abortions as well as those in abortion centres during the difficult weeks of lock-down will be likely to mean this year’s figures will be even higher. We really need to make up for lost time with Our Lord as churches re-open and make up for lost ground in the fight against abortion.

The Good Counsel Network has two prayer rotas. You can join our Rosary Rota where you say a Rosary for our work once a month, we will send you the date and which Mysteries to say to ensure that we have people praying each day for the Mothers that we are helping. You can join our Adoration Rota where you agree to do an hours Adoration each week in a Church of your choosing. You can sign up for one or both of these Prayer Rotas here; https://goodcounselnet.co.uk/sign-up-for-info

Adoration and Pro-Life Work

Sometimes I am so busy trying to get things done at home that I am tempted to miss the hour of Adoration that I usually put aside each week.

Then I remember Jesus words and He reminds me “Would you not spend one hour with me?”.

And I think of how vital Adoration is to our pro-life work and I know that I must make every effort to be there and pray before God for the success of our work and to put prayer before other things. So many of the saints have had such great devotion to the Blessed Sacrament and so it is important to follow their example and offer it to God.
When I am at Adoration I try to remember the first names of the women who have contacted our centre so that I can pray for them and especially if I know that somebody will be counselling them on that day and I always include all woman seeking abortion throughout the world at this time. I also pray for their conversions and for the baby’s father’s conversion because I know that this is very important for their salvation. It is vital to pray for the counsellors too and for the vigils that are taking place outside the clinics.
There are also some really good dedicated supporters who pray an hour of Adoration each week or more especially for our work and people who pray at our centre chapel at our monthly first Friday all night Adoration and I am sure that as a result of their sacrifices, dedication and efforts there have been many turnarounds from the abortuaries. I have witnessed myself that on the occasions when there has been all night Adoration we have had more turnarounds the next day from the abortuaries. And I believe Mother Theresa's words when she said that if enough people prayed before the Blessed Sacrament that abortion would end completely.

If you can join our Adoration Rota, offering an hour of Adoration each week in a Church of your choice, or our Rosary Rota, offering a Rosary each month for our work, please click here to sign up, or call us on 02077231740.

Lorraine Coyne

New Tabernacle Installed

Our Tabernacle before (left) and after (below).

We recently asked readers to contribute towards the renovation of an old tabernacle we had been given. Our aim was to replace the tiny tabernacle we had been using with one more suited to our daily Mass and Adoration schedule.

Fr Timothy Finigan had the following to say on the subject:

The tabernacle currently in use is not large enough properly to hold the pyx which contains the Benediction host. It has to be put in (reverently, of course) on its side, in order to fit into the small tabernacle along with the ciborium.

I'm delighted to see that there is now a better tabernacle (see the Maria Stops Abortion blog) donated by a kind priest. Quite properly it has been re-gilded to make it more respectable to hold the Blessed Sacrament. The cost was £1000 - maybe someone might be able to cover this? It would help keep funds available for the vital work of safeguarding unborn children and assisting mothers who are in trouble.

you can see his whole article for 28 May on The Good Counsel Network by clicking here. The new tabernacle is now fitted, but it is not too late to donate to this appeal, please help if you can. Adoration is vital to our work. Helping women to change their minds in the most difficult crisis pregnancy situations.

Clare McCullough