We transform the culture by being ‘wounds of love’ for the world

by Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann

Editor’s note: The following was adapted from Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann’s homily at the 2025 National Prayer Vigil for Life, delivered at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C.

In 1999, Pope John Paul came to St. Louis for a pastoral visit and, as was his custom, he wanted to meet with young people, so we held a gathering in the hockey stadium. The theme of his talk that night to the young people was to challenge them: “Be light as only young people can be light.” The Lord has this particular love for the young to be his instruments of grace in the world.

Consider Jeremiah, who talks about how the Lord formed him in the womb and who protested that he was too young. God told him, “Say not that you are too young. I will put my words in your mouth.”

Or think of St. John the Apostle, the beloved of the Lord, who was just a teenager when he received the call to follow Our Lord. Think of Joan of Arc, the amazing young woman who heard the voices of the saints and of God calling her to an impossible mission. She was open to the Lord’s call, not so much to preserve France, but to revive the faith of the French people.

Think of St. Agnes, a 12-year-old virgin-martyr of the early church, who inspired some of the great saints. There is a beautiful reading from St. Ambrose in the office of readings in the Liturgy of the Hours, describing how her executioner trembled as she willingly submitted her life to martyrdom. Think of modern saints like Carlo Acutis, a great apostle of the Eucharist. 

So, my good young people, say not that you are too young to be a light in our culture and society. You have a unique power to be that light.

After the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, which returned to state Legislatures the authority to determine public policy regarding abortion, the pro-life community was celebrative. We have experienced since that time, though, many disappointments with the outcome of state referendums, beginning with our state of Kansas.

Part of the reason that we lost in Kansas, and I think this is true in other places, is that there was a great outpouring of new young voters who voted for legal abortion. This amendment did not pass particularly because of the young people, and I can understand that in many ways. They have grown up in a culture where they have never known anything but legalized abortion, a culture of death. They have grown up in a culture where they have seen so much infidelity in love. They have grown up in a culture where my generation has failed to protect them from a pornography industry that targets children and young people to addict them to this phony and false kind of love.

I believe Pope Francis chose the theme for this Jubilee Holy Year to be “Pilgrims of Hope” because he noted that in our particular time, our world needs a renewal of hope. In so doing, the pope identified what so many in the social sciences have termed as epidemics of anxiety, loneliness, depression and despair, especially among young people. As Christians, we understand ourselves to be pilgrims. This world is not our final destination. We are on a journey through the world to the heavenly kingdom for which Jesus is the gate and door.

My good young people, you are called to be witnesses to your peers. You are called to help them to come to know what gives you hope. These defeats and epidemics have been sober reminders that we need to reintensify our efforts to build a culture of life. Jesus never promised his disciples an easy life. In fact, he said that if we are going to follow him, we have to follow him all the way to Calvary; that we have to be prepared to take up the cross.

To transform our culture, we must touch hearts by efforts like Walking with Moms in Need, where we try to surround women in difficult pregnancies with a community of love and support; by efforts like Project Rachel, an important healing and forgiving ministry for those who have been involved with abortion; by ministries like And Then There Were None, started by Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood director who began this ministry to bring people out of the abortion industry and to give them a renewed life, freeing them from that culture of death, that culture of darkness.

We must touch minds with the truth of the life and the dignity of every human person, a truth that can be arrived at by reason. But we must also touch hearts. In the First Letter of St. Peter, the first pope reminded us that we must always be prepared to share with others the reason for our hope.

The reason for our hope is the Word made flesh. The reason for our hope is a God who pursues us despite our sinfulness, our brokenness. Our reason for hope is anchored in the Creator of the cosmos choosing to become an embryo in the womb of Mary, to be born in the poor circumstances of Bethlehem, to be an infant refugee fleeing a tyrannical king, to be a boy growing up in the small town of Nazareth, to be a laborer, a carpenter, who knew what it was to work hard, to exercise his public ministry in this obscure region of the world, the backwaters of the Roman Empire, according to the worldly leaders of the time, and ultimately to give his life on Calvary so that we could be transformed by divine mercy, and with his Easter victory of life, give us a destiny to live with him and the saints forever.

My friend Bishop (Daniel) Thomas’ episcopal motto in English is: “My Lord and my God,” the words of the apostle St. Thomas, doubting Thomas, after touching the wounds of the love of Jesus. This is how we transform culture: by allowing ourselves to become wounds of love for our world.  Help your peers, dear young people, to know that they are made in the divine image; see in them a reflection of God; help them know that they are of such worth that God died for them as well; and help them to reject all of the false narratives of our modern culture and society. With the love of God revealed in the Word made flesh in Jesus Christ, how can we not have hope?

My dear young people, be witnesses of hope and love in the world; be heralds of the “Gospel of Life”! Jesus, the Word made flesh, who humbled himself to be an embryo in Mary and humbles himself again to be present to you in the Eucharist, will give you food for the journey. Take up the banner to be pilgrims of hope, intent on building a culture of life and a civilization of love!