Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Catholic Register
January 22, 2026
“In all the Dioceses of the United States of America, January 22 … shall be observed as a particular day of prayer for the full restoration of the legal guarantee of the right to life and of penance for violations to the dignity of the human person committed through acts of abortion,” states the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, which the Catholic Church uses at Mass.
The Church encourages priests in the U.S. to celebrate on this day either a “Mass for Giving Thanks to God for the Gift of Human Life” or a Mass “For the Preservation of Peace and Justice,” turning the attention of daily Mass goers to praying for life at Mass. The Church also asks both daily Mass goers and those who can’t come to mark this whole day with prayer and penance, encouraging the faithful, in addition to Mass, to fast, abstain from meat, pray a decade of the Rosary, pray the Divine Mercy Chapel, offer a prayer for life to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, give up TV and movies for the delay and sacrifice some free time to do small acts of service.
January 22 was chosen as the Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children because it was on this day in 1973 that the notorious Supreme Court decisions Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton were published, which effectively made abortion legal for all nine months of pregnancy throughout the United States.
Even after the Dobbs v. Jackson in 2022 overturned Roe and made it possible for states to restrict and eliminate abortion, we know that we are still far from the “full restoration of the legal guarantee of the right to life” and from “violations to the dignity of the human person committed through acts of abortion.”
Nine states and the District of Columbia continue to allow unlimited abortions. 22 States allow abortion for the first 18-24 weeks, two for the first 12 weeks, four for the first four weeks. And even in the 13 states that ban abortion, many moms travel to nearby states where abortion is legal or obtain abortion pills chemically to end the life of their little boy or girl growing within.
Just like the prayer, fasting and abstinence that the Church lives on Ash Wednesday, Good Friday and the Fridays of Lent are more than a call to individual believers to our communion with his passion, but a collective witness as Jesus’ Bride and Body, so the way the Church lives Jan. 22 is likewise meant, beyond the sum of individual prayers, sacrifices and good works, to provide a compelling testimony of the Church’s commitment to proclaiming, living and transforming society with the Gospel of Life.
We know that the need for that Gospel remains urgent. There are still over 1.1 million abortions a year in the US, which means that 130 babies an hour — two every minute — have their life terminated at the stage of growth you and I once were. Those attacks on human dignity are compounded by the growing practice of euthanasia (euphemistically dubbed Medical Assistance in Dying) in 12 states and the District of Columbia, by the creation and freezing of hundreds of thousands of embryonic human beings in fertility clinics, by the 20,000 homicides outside the womb a year in the US alone including multiple mass murders, by the dehumanization and mistreatment of various categories of immigrants, and by a litany of other acts of violence against others.
For Christians to be faithful to Jesus’ command to proclaim the Gospel, we must proclaim the Gospel of life. As St. John Paul II wrote in his classic 1995 encyclical Evangelium Vitae, “To proclaim Jesus is itself to proclaim life. For Jesus is ‘the word of life’ (1 Jn 1:1). In him ‘life was made manifest’ (1 Jn 1:2); he himself is ‘the eternal life who was with the Father and was made manifest to us’ (1 Jn 1:2). … We need to bring the Gospel of life to the heart of every man and woman and to make it penetrate every part of society.”
The great pope of life declared that “the core of this Gospel” is “the proclamation of a living God who is close to us, who calls us to profound communion with himself and awakens in us the certain hope of eternal life. It is the affirmation of the inseparable connection between the person, his life and his bodiliness. It is the presentation of human life as a life of relationship, a gift of God, the fruit and sign of his love. It is the proclamation that Jesus has a unique relationship with every person, which enables us to see in every human face the face of Christ.”
He addef that our mission of and for life “also involves making clear all the consequences of this Gospel. These can be summed up as follows: human life, as a gift of God, is sacred and inviolable. For this reason procured abortion and euthanasia are absolutely unacceptable. Not only must human life not be taken, but it must be protected with loving concern. … To be truly a people at the service of life we must propose these truths constantly and courageously from the very first proclamation of the Gospel, and thereafter in catechesis, in the various forms of preaching, in personal dialogue and in all educational activity.”
This mission must be proclaimed with faith working through love in the “sanctuary of life” he calls the family in their commitment to raising children, in the heroism of “brave mothers” within a culture that often doesn’t support women as moms, and in the “service of charity, which finds expression in personal witness, various forms of volunteer work, social activity and political commitment.”
To carry out this mission is obviously challenging, but we shouldn’t exaggerate the difficulties.
The first Christians lived in a Greco-Roman world where abortion and infanticide were widely accepted and legally protected. Newborn children, especially the poor and the disabled, were often exposed and left to die. Yet the first Christians did not remain silent or on the sidelines. Not ashamed of the Gospel, in the world but not “of” it, they knew that an integral part of proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ was to transform the culture of death into one of life. So they rescued abandoned infants, cared for pregnant women in distress and proclaimed that every life belongs to God. Over time they converted the brutal Roman empire to Christ and to the “life” he came into the world to give us to the full (Jn 10:10).
To proclaim the Gospel of life today will often similarly provoke misunderstanding and hostility. To announce that God’s love extends to every human being, even and especially who some consider inconvenient, burdensome or unwanted, is to invite opposition, and, if others’ consciences don’t recoil at the thought of taking innocent human life, or at Jesus’ words that “whatever you do to the least of my brethren, you do to me” (Mt 25:31-46), then we shouldn’t expect limits in what they might do to us. The first Christians, however, had far fewer numbers and resources than we do. Therefore, despite all the opposition, we can be hopeful about the conversion of our culture, too, provided that we’re as docile to the Holy Spirit, “the Lord and Giver of life” as they were.
Jesus identified as the One who “comes down from heaven and gives life to the world” and promised, “He who follows me … will have the light of life” (Jn 6:33; 8:12). He is the Gospel of life and his incarnation is not just the initiation of his saving work, but also the source of the Church’s mission and the ultimate ground for the human dignity the Church proclaims and defends.
As we, together with all the faithful of the Church in the United States, generously live this day of prayer, penance and charity, let us ask the Holy Spirit to help us be faithful, courageous, and effective in carrying out our individual and collective mission of proclaiming the Gospel of life, to every creature, in season and out of season, with every means at our disposal.