By Amelia Kibbe
Advisory Editor
With less than a week to go before the 2017 March for Life, senior LaurieAnne Wickens worked making final travel arrangements for the trip to Washington D.C. for the annual pro-life march.
Determined to make this year’s trip a success, Wickens, president of St. Bonaventure’s pro-life club, carefully watched the weather, hoping an impending snowstorm would not hinder the group’s Jan. 26 departure from the university.
In her four years at St. Bonaventure, Wickens had yet to make it to a march; two years the group had to cancel due to dangerous weather and one year she studied abroad.
Less than 24 hours before the 10-member group planned to leave, Wickens, now a senior, began feeling ill. But, she said, she forced herself to recover quickly and the next morning helped her friends cram sleeping bags and pro-life signs into a van to head south.
Each year the March for Life takes place during or around the week of Jan. 22, the day in 1973 when the United States Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in favor of legalizing abortion in the United States, according to marchforlife.org. Since January 1974, thousands of pro-life supporters have gathered in the nation’s capital to protest the ruling, ending each year’s march at the steps of the Supreme Court building. Although a 2017 attendance estimate has not been announced, crowd sizes generally range in the several hundred thousand.
“When we left here, it was snowing,” said Wickens, a marketing major. “But by the time we got to Washington, the weather was actually really nice, just a bit chilly.”
SBU for Life, the pro-life club, receives funding from the university’s Student Government Association as well as an anonymous donor to help fund the trip, while the housing is provided free through a Franciscan school in Washington. This year, the group left Jan. 26 and returned Jan. 30 after a day of sightseeing and celebration of Mass, Wickens said.
“It was so amazing to actually be there and see so many people marching for what they believe in,” she said. “I really believe in the value of life at all stages, and this was a demonstration of that. It wasn’t overwhelming in the crowd sense; it was just so nice to all be there together.”
Although the crowd demographic varied drastically, Wickens said she was pleased to see many younger people, including young parents and children.
Father Peter Schneible, the more than 20-year advisor for SBU for Life who went to Washington with the group, also noticed a young vibe in the crowds, he said.
“I think that’s one of the most encouraging things,” he said. “I think that gives us hope for the future. They are students who will become the leaders of tomorrow, who will take this consciousness into the rest of their lives.”
Both Schneible and Wickens said generally the March for Life does not attract large amounts of media coverage, and according to a Jan. 30 Washington Times article, the previous week’s Women’s March received three times as much air time from the media than the pro-life march. However, the article added media coverage was up this year, and Wickens said she saw both CNN and Fox News at the event.
Every four years, the March for Life takes places the week after the 22, so as not to coincide with the inauguration of a president, Schneible said. While the biggest pro-life march is in Washington each year, other locations around the country often have smaller marches and protests of the ruling as well.
“A number of people have said to me before, ‘Why do you do this? It’s been a number of years and things haven’t changed,’” Schneible said. “But I think that the dedication of the people to go year after year indicates that there are a large number of people are not happy [with the ruling]. I think the march has kept this issue in the public consciousness…. even if we did have a change in the ruling, there would have to be a change in the hearts of the American people ultimately.”
The group of current Bonnies met with many St. Bonaventure alumni, including 2015 graduates Michael Specht, Jason Damon and Troy Hillman.
“One of the great joys of this particular trip was having a bunch of interactions with alumni [who] I didn’t know that I would see,” Schneible said.
Schneible also said he hopes to see the number of Bonnies attending grow each year, saying the pro-life belief is an important one in the Franciscan tradition.
“It is an issue that the church has always been quite strong on,” he said. “One has to be for life in all its places.…we have to do it in a way that brings people together…. There is no doubt that pregnancy has a huge effect that I cannot understand, so I think those of us who are pro-life have to be as consistent as we can about life in all circumstances and also to support the women.”
Wickens, who will remain at St. Bonaventure another year to complete her Master’s degree, said the 2018 March for Life is already on her calendar.
“Now that I have gone once, I have caught a bug,” she said. “I want to go every year.”
kibbeaa13@bonaventure.edu
