More than 6,000 pro-life advocates turned out Monday for the fifth annual March for Life Pennsylvania in Harrisburg. I was honored to be among them again. In fact it was a pleasure to strengthen ties again with like-minded advocates of life from conception to natural death.
With abortion legal until 24 weeks in our state and a governor so committed to “access” that he eliminated funding for pregnancy resource centers that offer mothers real choice, this gathering grows in importance – and attendance – each year.
We need our elected representatives to know we are pro-life, and we vote.
“We’re here on the Capitol rounds but making a witness, making a statement on behalf of the unborn and on behalf of the women who are pregnant with the unborn that every life is precious. We support the sanctity of life, and we want to make that voice known all across the Commonwealth,” said Michael Geer, president and CEO of the Pennsylvania Family Institute, which organizes the event with the national March for Life organization.
WOW! Thousands of people join the Pennsylvania March for Life today to protest abortion.
📽️@PFIpolicy pic.twitter.com/sHnuVmwDJb
— LifeNews.com (@LifeNewsHQ) September 22, 2025
To get to Harrisburg, I drove to Lancaster, about 90 minutes from home, concelebrated Mass at St. Philip the Apostle Church and then boarded a bus with a joyful group of people from Lancaster Right to Life. We prayed Priests for Life’s “Prayer to End Abortion” and its “Litany” to end abortion, while on the bus during the hourlong ride to the capital. The organizer, Rosie Gross, was well organized with prayer, information, and food!
When we arrived, we were surrounded by a sea of young people, some carrying signs to remember slain activist Charlie Kirk. Representatives from the organization he founded, Turning Point USA, spoke at the gathering, as did a number of pro-life lawmakers. Ryan Bomberger from the Radiance Foundation was the keynote speaker and kept things moving smoothly and attractively.
Though we have no major elections coming up in November in Pennsylvania, pro-life voters do have a chance to make a difference in the voting booth and this was a topic of some conversation at the march.
Pro-abortion Democrats currently hold a 5-2 majority on the state Supreme Court, but three are facing retention votes this year. If any justices are voted out, the balance of power could shift. Although the retention vote aims to be non-partisan, people at the march handed out fliers urging attendees to vote for Republican judges, and against the retention of the three recent Democrat justices who overturned the 40-year state law which, with certain exceptions, had prohibited Medicaid funding for abortions.
There are also Democrat-led efforts to push for a constitutional amendment to impose a right to abortion in the Pennsylvania constitution. Counter efforts in the legislature to save babies’ lives have been stymied as well, given the dead-locked representation in the two chambers, with a pro-abortion Democratic governor to boot.
Elections have serious consequences, as do popular referenda. Let’s help one another to be properly informed and to take that info to the voting booth and in our conversations unfettered. Charlie Kirk showed us the way through the Way, Truth, and Life, that is Jesus Christ, our Lord.
LifeNews Note: Father Denis Wilde, OSA, is chaplain for Priests for Life
