By Adriana Fuhlage,  Tolton Senior

This year, around 100,000 people gathered in Washington D.C. to march for life. Out of those 100,000 people were 39 students from Tolton Catholic. We voyaged 22 long hours to get to D.C., but it was all worth it for the experience, hope, and insight that the march brought us.

This was my third year going on the March for Life and I’ve looked forward to it every year. You don’t really understand the influence it can have on your perspective on the pro-life movement until you attend and march alongside those thousands of people who are all uniting for their love for life. Each person has their own story, their own reason for why they march. Some people even shared their stories with the whole crowd of people at the rally before the march. These people are full of passion and love, not hate and hopelessness and I think that also has a big impact on the feeling that you get when marching. It makes you feel empowered to be standing up for something bigger than yourself and to know in your heart that it is a good cause. Something that seems more clear to me every march is how God puts us in positions to touch others and be touched by others; each person has a beautiful life that God has planned for them and no one should be given the right to take that away.

This year, the march’s theme was “love saves lives” and I think that the love that filled D.C. for those few hours on January 19th really proved this can be true. It is not easy to protect the dignity of human lives at times, but it is worthwhile. The March for Life is a life-changing witness to God’s power to bring people together through love for the precious gift of life, and I plan to continue to protect this gift as much as I can as I head to Texas Christian University next year.