By M.A. Student José Freire Nunes
Nellie Gray – a successful U.S government attorney and convert to the Catholic faith – decided to resign in 1973 from her professional position and dedicate herself to the pro-life cause. Her decision was motivated by the Supreme Court ruling on Roe v. Wade whereby the justices acknowledged abortion as a constitutional right encompassed in the right to privacy under the 14th amendment. She reacted to it by organizing the first March for Life in 1974 and committing herself to march every year in Washington DC until the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Within a few years, the March for Life grew from 20,000 attendees in 1974 to the largest annual human rights demonstration in the world. Nellie Gray died in 2012 before she could witness the Supreme Court ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in 2022 which overturned Roe v. Wade. Similarly to many pivotal figures in history who played a major role in upholding human dignity – such as Maximilian Kolbe, John Paul II, and Mother Teresa – Nellie Gray’s vision transcended her own existence and remains alive proving that the communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living as once put by T.S Eliot.
The March for Life is predicated on a myriad of rights stemming from natural law recognized by the Magisterium of the Church and the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights alike, namely: the right to life (article 3), freedom of religion (article 18), freedom of expression (article 19), and freedom of association (article 20); the March’s very existence is only possible thanks to the recognition by society and political authorities that human beings have moral agency and are entitled to freely associate in the pursuit of legitimate ends. The Catholic Church ties these truths to the fact that man was created in the image and likeness of God (Gn 1:26-28) sharing with the Creator the capacity to engage in relationships just as the three persons of the Trinity.
Pope Benedict XVI reiterated many times during his papacy the necessity of a creative minority to restore civilization. He borrowed this expression from English historian Arnold Toynbee who held that civilizations collapse from lack of internal cohesion rather than by foreign aggression. Nellie Gray and the other first organizers of the March for Life are among the countless creative minorities who throughout history have produced fundamental transformations in society by responding to God’s calling in their own time and place. Rather than achieving the goal they initially intended, their legacy surpassed their own expectations because by uniting themselves to God their work also became the work of God which transcends time and space. The Dobbs decision may prove to trickle down to other national jurisdictions and create a persuasive precedent for the European Court of Human Rights and other international human rights’ courts.
Common sense may advise people not to set their expectations too high in order to avoid being disappointed at the outcome of an enterprise. However, Revelation teaches that those united to Christ will achieve far more than they expected as exemplified in the life of Nellie Gray and her legacy in the March for Life. She shifted the Overton Window from something unthinkable in 1974 to reality in 2023 embodying the longstanding optimism of Americans who believe that nothing is impossible – especially to God.
