Local churches launch prayer campaign to change hearts on abortion
Next week marks the beginning of the second "40 Days for Life" campaign to be held in North County. The church-based anti-abortion effort, which lasts from Wednesday through March 28, is based on prayer, fasting and a round-the-clock peaceful vigil outside the Palomar Pomerado Health building in San Marcos, where abortions are performed.
The nationwide campaign, which will be occurring simultaneously in 162 other communities as well as in a few international locations, is aimed at building support to end abortion.
"We're not there to prevent people from going in," said Ted Stearns, one of the local campagin's organizers. "We're to be a visible presence, and if there's someone contemplating abortion, they have someone to reach out to."
Many of the prayer volunteers are connected to abortion alternative organizations, such as Stearns, whose wife has been the executive director of Birth Choice of San Marcos for 22 years.
The 40-day campaign will kick off locally a day early, at 6:45 p.m. Tuesday with a candlelight vigil outside the clinic.
Organizers said the duration of the interdenominational Christian campaign comes from the Bible, in which God used 40 days for significant life changes ---- such as when Noah stayed on the ark for 40 days during the flood, or when Jesus Christ returned to the disciples for 40 days after his resurrection.
Although the campaign is intended to be 24 hours a day, there are some gaps in the schedule, said Elena Di Ventra, who helped start the North County campaign last fall. As a parishioner at St. Elizabeth Seton Catholic Church in Carlsbad, she was interested in the pro-life arena and heard about the 40 Days campaign on EWTC, a Catholic TV network. She decided to bring the campaign to North County, starting with the fall 2009 event.
A volunteer in a pro-life pregnancy center, Di Ventra said, "That's something we really have a heart for ---- those women who are contemplating abortion."
The first campaign, which ended in November and which was staged outside the same San Marcos clinic, drew more than 500 participants from about 20 local congregations, Di Ventra said, and she expects more this year. Organizers have encouraged local churches to "adopt" a day of the schedule and be responsible for covering all the shifts that day.
During each two-hour shift, the volunteers generally pray and hold signs. However, during the three days a week that abortions are performed at the clinic, the vigil will take on a more somber, quieter tone. No one is to hold a sign, and there will not be much socializing among volunteers.
"We want to be sensitive about who is entering the clinic those days," Di Ventra said.
Nationally, the campaign, which started in the Texas towns of Bryan and College Station in 2004, say they have helped prevent more than 2,000 abortions so far ---- based on more than 2,000 women who have approached them to say that the vigil affected them.
"A lot of people would like to see abortion end overnight," Stearns said, "but it starts with changing the hearts of the people in this nation first."
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