Faith Filled Friday: My First March For Life [UPDATED]

UPDATE, 31 Jan 2016: I was able to upload the videos through Youtube.  Thanks Kelly!

I finally got to go last week to the annual March for Life in Washington, D.C.  I had been trying to go for a number of years.  Either something at work conflicted or one year there was a snowstorm the day before which, having missed getting on the Church bus, left a drive down impossible.  This year I signed up for the bus early and despite the coming snowstorm that afternoon I ventured it.

It was an inauspicious start.  Driving to the church where the meetup was to take place, I got stopped by a cop for—of all things—a taillight that was out.  I thought I had ran a stop sign or a red light.  He gave me a summons that said if I took care of it and took the receipt to the police precinct within 24 hours it would get dropped.  Where was I going to find the time with an approaching snowmageddon?  Well I didn’t, but that’s another story.

When I got to the church at 6:30 AM I didn’t realize there would be a mass and then a sendoff.  So we got on the road a good fifteen minutes after seven, made another local stop to pick more people up, and we headed out.  We only had half a bus full, given a lot of people bailed because of the weather, which was to hit D.C. by that afternoon.  So I had a nice comfortable double seat on the bus and napped and read all the way down.  Except for a quick breakfast stop in one of those Delaware rest areas.  We got to D.C just before noon and were marching by twelve-thirty.

Here are some pictures.

Here are some sights and sounds with a movie clip.

By two o'clock, it started to snow.  You can see here.  From what I was told by the veterans who had been to these annually this was about half the turn out of other years.  The storm did have an impact.

There were plenty of silly signs, like this silly face.

Here's a picture of our bus group, or a few of us from the bus.  i'm the ugly guy on the right.  We had green scarves to identify each other so we could keep close and not have a difficult time gathering for our return.  Still we had a "lost sheep" that required time and effort to find before we left.  

Here's another movie clip.  There was a Scottish fife and drum band.

And finally we got back on the bus as the storm picked up.  We got ahead of it at some point.

I can’t wait for next year.  Pro-life is a lifelong passion of mine.  If this was half the typical turnout, I'm looking forward to experiencing a regular turnout!