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Being Pro-Life at Cornell:
A Checklist
- Pray and fast for children, mothers, and families. Make spiritual reparations for the outrages of abortion, child poverty, child abuse, parental and societal neglect, and other sins against the family that cry out to heaven.
- Talk to your friends about why you believe having children is worth it. Many people doubt this now, because they believe that having children is incompatible with pursuing a career! Prioritize families and children in your own life over and above your own comfort and career.
- Be there for the women in your life when they are pregnant and having and raising their children. "Be there" means showing up to change diapers and clean the house and do the laundry and mostly keep your mouth shut. Do this whether you are a man or a woman. Keep being there until those kids are at least 18.
- Be there for the men in your life when their wives (or girlfriends, if it be the case) are pregnant and having children. Hold fathers accountable for their choices and actions. Help and encourage them to be good, loving, provident fathers.
- Check out the Catholic Charities Fatherhood Initiative!
- Give money, clothes, and food to women's shelters, food pantries, or your local Birthright chapter.
- You can donate to Birthright of Ithaca via Venmo @Cornell-Catholic (include the message "Birthright")
- Support pro-family policies like child tax credits, paid family leave, universal PreK, SNAP and WIC programs ("food stamps"), job training programs, and other programs that benefit families and especially low-income families.
- Get married and raise a Catholic family!
- If you're a man and feel called to the vocation of marriage, start practicing today to be a good husband and father. Find a man who is a father whom you admire and imitate him. Practice being quiet (usually) and generous (financially and emotionally). Practice preferring the menial tasks. Don't treat any person, especially not a woman you are dating, as a means for self-gratification (sexual, emotional, culinary, or otherwise). Date a woman seriously by assuming she is smarter than you are, being honest with her, respecting and loving her, being appropriately affectionate, and by marrying her. The measure of a man is not how charming and polite he can manage to be sometimes, but rather how crude and stupid he is willing to be usually.
- If you're a woman and feel called to the vocation of marriage, seek out and cultivate relationships with female role models who can help you think through your vocation in a holistic way (which may include, but is broader than, your career). Don't be shy about discussing with your girlfriends and role models the difficult question of motherhood and professional advancement before you are married. There are many different kinds of solutions! The asymmetric biological burden of motherhood is good reason to expect, demand, and accept the help and support of your family, friends, and community. Hold the men around you, especially the ones you date, accountable. Show them that you expect them to be good, loving, provident husbands and fathers. Do not be embarrassed about demanding respect and sacrifice from men.
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support cornellians for life!