By John Gleason

On Aug. 25, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., will lead a peaceful prayer vigil and candlelight rally in Martin Luther King Park, located one block west of a new Planned Parenthood clinic in Denver.

Archbishop Chaput will be joined by Alveda King, director of Gospel of Life Ministries and niece of the late civil rights leader Martin Luther King. The event is being promoted by the Respect Life Office and the Office of Black Catholic Ministry of the Archdiocese of Denver.

King will address abortion as the civil rights issue of today and how Planned Parenthood is targeting their abortion services toward African American and Hispanic women. Mimi Eckstein, director of the Respect Life Office said pro-lifers are excited at the prospect of King coming to Denver to participate in this event.

"Dr. King's ministry is one of life," Eckstein said. "She travels around the country addressing issues that are of great concern to the black community. She talks about fatherless families, poverty, AIDS and abortion. She comes to expose abortion for what it is."

Eckstein went on to say that Archbishop Chaput and King want to raise community awareness about Planned Parenthood, specifically to this clinic and what it bodes for the black community.

"The community needs to know what this organization is doing," Eckstein said, "and how it damages our city to have it in our midst."

Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the United States, where three out of four clinics are in minority communities. Although blacks make up 12 percent of the population, they make up more than a third of the abortions performed in this nation. In 1993, a study by Howard University revealed that African American women over age 50 were almost five times more likely to get breast cancer if they had had an abortion compared to women who had not had one.

In 2006, in an open letter to African American leaders, King, borrowing a phrase from Pope John Paul II, said a culture of death has been unleashed in this nation.

"Our children commit violent acts against themselves," she said. "Because we have committed over 40 million legal murders in our history, our children can't discern between what is good, what is legal and what is right."

Of the 40 million babies aborted since 1973, 13 million were black.

"This is an appeal to all people of good will," King said. "Especially to African American leaders to stop the violence, save the children and restore the culture of life to America."

In a separate pro-life speech, King declared that she "joined the voices of thousands across America who are silent no more; who can no longer sit idly by and allow this horrible spirit of murder to cut down and cut away our unborn and destroy the lives of our mothers."

The rally and prayer vigil will take place exactly one month after the 40th anniversary of "Humanae Vitae" ("Of Human Life"), the encyclical written and promulgated by Pope Paul VI on married love and procreation. The document reaffirmed Church teaching that artificial contraception is morally wrong.

"'Humanae Vitae' is the document of the Catholic Church in which Pope Paul VI courageously and accurately predicted that the widespread use of contraception would prove to have dire consequences for women and men in our society, " noted Eckstein. "He accurately predicted that there would be a breakdown in family life, a breakdown in respect for women and their unique gifts, and that abortion would be used as birth control. Planned Parenthood embodies these predictions like no other entity in our American society today.

"Every day," she continued, "unborn children are aborted, women are provided with sterilizations and contraceptive methods that place their health and life in jeopardy, and teenagers are encouraged to be sexually active regardless of their age and without parental involvement."

The prayer vigil will start at 7:30 p.m. in the park located at East 38th Avenue and Newport Street in Denver. Following the vigil, a prayerful candlelight rally will take place around the perimeter of the Planned Parenthood Clinic at 7155 E. 38th Ave. For more information, call 303-715-3205.

Editor's note: This article has been reprinted with permission by the Denver Catholic Register.