Many of the thousands of converts received into the Catholic Church every year say one of the major reasons they came home was the Church’s timeless stance on faith and morals, withstanding all attacks — attacks that go back to Christ’s temptation in the desert.

When we meditate on Christ’s temptation during Lent, we see that Satan works to take the skin of the truth and wrap it around deeply destructive lies.

We see this today, as there are those in secular society who would like to see the Church change its unalterable stances on human life, human sexuality, contraception, abortion and assisted suicide. They often take the clear truths of Church teaching and infuse them with contemporary buzzwords, emotive slogans and pop psychology.

We know there has been organic development of Church doctrine — in areas where modern science has illuminated new discoveries, for example — but our society today is forging a new frontier, seeking to redefine truth itself.

As we witnessed at the just-concluded 2018 March for Life in Washington, there is a lot of agreement on what the Church teaches. So, take heart and have courage as we move through the year ahead. Let us defend the Church’s teaching on life against the culture of death with not only hope and charity, but also with decisiveness.

God bless you!