Children are treasures. They are the good, happiness, and hope in our life. They are our future. It is to protect their lives that all over the world the Pro Life movement has started. The movement is fighting for the life of embryos, as human life starts at the very moment of conception. From that very moment it becomes saint, honourable, and has to be protected.
The Pro Life movement started its work in Transcarpathia in 2008. Bishop Antal Majnek noticed that it was time to act in a way that a program has to be started to defend human life against the huge number of abortions.
A very important area of life protection is prevention. Education concerning basic life facts and respect for human life should start at an age that is still young enough for prevention. It is to serve this cause why information sessions have been organized to inform youngsters about proper sexual behaviour, abortion and post-abortion syndrome. Teenagers are open to talk about these topics, as they are considered to be taboos at home. Most of them have never heard such pieces of information that they encounter during the information sessions.
To help those people, who are in a difficult situation already, and do not find a way out other than abortion, our movement opened an office, where pregnant women who are in a critical situation can discuss their problems with specialists. We are also operating a phone hotline where women can ask for help concerning their unwanted pregnancy. Organizing the consultation project at hospitals has also began, which includes that gynaecologists should send their patients asking for abortion for a consultation to a pro-life organization before the actual abortion operation is carried out.
We must not forget the deep and painful suffering that most of the women experience after abortions. Women are suffering from the aftermaths, the consequences often even decades after. Abortion causes not only physical wounds but mental, spiritual wounds as well, that women cannot digest without assistance. Therefore, the Pro Life Project focuses not only on saving babies, but on women's traumas after abortions, and their treatment. With this aim in mind, retreats are organized for women who experienced abortion. During the weekend-long retreats mental and spiritual healings occur, participants come to realize God's forgiveness, and can forgive themselves, too. This is inevitably important so that they can lead a balanced and full life afterwards.
The movement is becoming more and more widespread. Fliers are distributed. Posters are designed and printed out that are later on displayed in various hospitals situated in various towns of Transcarpathia. It was several months ago, when posters appeared on light billboards at 25 places in Uzghorod and Mukachevo. The printing house did not ask for any allowance, in order to serve the true cause. These billboards impress people a lot. From the feedback of doctors we know that in the first half of the year in Mukachevo they had 5-10 abortions daily and it fell to 2 abortions per day. The project has intensive reactions. One of the reporters working at the Television of Mukachevo has already conducted an interview with one of our organizers.
In June we had the March for Life, in which the representatives of the Orthodox, Greek Catholic, Protestant, Roman Catholic churches took part, including four bishops. The march started from the different churches - after an hour of prayer -, then the groups united and marched to the Gyneacological Clinique. The Mayor of Mukachevo also joined the collective action.
Training the leaders of the project is continuous. According to the organizers this is a hard job, because we do not really know the outcome of it, as we rarely have concrete feedback about those children that were born thanks to the Pro Life Project.
"Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him." (Psalms, 127:3).