March for Life: Catholics and Evangelicals

For years, Catholic University students have supported March for Life, the pro-life (or anti-abortion if you're on the other side of the debate) rally held annually in Washington DC. Several of my students informed me they would be participating on Fri. and thus absent from class. I decided to cancel class for Fri, although mother nature later took care of this.

One difference this year is the prominent participation of evangelical Christians in the March for Life. One would assume evangelicals would embrace the movement given their opposition to abortion, but Washington Post reporter Michelle Boorstein offers: "the reasons evangelicals haven’t been joining Catholics in public activism recently are theological, cultural and political." Pro-life advocate and Liberty University faculty Karen Swallow Prior probes deeper:

"Evangelical Protestants were deeply anti-Catholic . . .Some thought, whatever Roman Catholics were for, we should be . Evangelicals are more politically conservative and come at abortion opposition with a different language. Catholics have long spoken of abortion as a 'social justice' cause not unlike fighting poverty, while evangelicals saw the issue through an individual morality lens and were wary of Catholic language that to them sounded liberal."

The recent joining of Evangelicals and Catholics is a reminder that "religion" neither necessarily divides or unites potential activists. Mobilization strategy and political opportunity in this case outweigh religious identity/ideology.