1. “There’s great doubt whether our religious exemption will stand the test of time.”

— Father Daniel White, vice chancellor and moderator of the Curia at the Burlington (Vt.) Diocese about the state’s response to church-run institutions

2. “People have been awakened because there have been more attacks on the pro-life policies on the federal level. More people are seeing the need to stand up for life.”

— Greg Schleppenbach, director of pro-life activities for the Nebraska Catholic Conference, on the U.S. pro-life movement

3. “Only marriage has the status that it does in the law because of its unique role as a human relationship which affects the public good.”

— Bishop Salvatore Cordileone

of Oakland, Calif.

4. “People are getting more socially conscious on the pro-life issue.”

— Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., outgoing co-chairman of the

Congressional Pro-Life Caucus

5. “We’re convinced that the truth is strong enough to change hearts.”

— Maggie Mahrt, co-director of and actress in the new Web-based

TV series ‘Bump+’

6. “We need to accompany the people, to be God’s presence, respecting them and seeing how God is truly present in his community.”

— Jesuit Father Kenneth Gavin, national director of Jesuit Refugee Services USA, on helping Haiti rebuild

7. “Saying more than the culture understands turns the Church into a lightning rod.”

— David Schindler of the John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family, in response to the Denver Archdiocese’s defense of the Church’s stance against homosexual parenting

8. “The civilization of love, as John Paul II and Benedict XVI have called for, seems to be a work of evangelization because in such a society God really is recognized as God. The problem of our times is a culture built without God.”

—Cardinal Antonio Cañizares Llovera, prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments

9. “The Catholic Church was at the forefront of this. I am not aware of any other organization that is doing as much as we’re doing, and at such a cost.”

— Andy Eisenzimmer, chancellor for civil affairs for the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis on the Church’s response to the abuse scandals.

10. “The midbrain, brainstem and cortex are all present in the fetus by 20 weeks gestation. This means that all the elements for the perception of pain are present by 20 weeks gestation.”

— Dr. Tom Grissom, a clinical instructor in the pain medicine center at the Washington School of Medicine, in reference to Nebraska’s fetal-pain law

11. “The biggest persecution of the Church doesn’t come from the enemies outside but is born from sin inside the Church.”

— Pope Benedict XVI on the sex-abuse cases during an in-flight press conference on his way to Portugal May 11

12. “Bear witness to all of the joy that his strong yet gentle presence evokes, starting with your contemporaries. Tell them that it is beautiful to be a friend of Jesus and that it is well worth following him.”

— Pope Benedict XVI

during his visit to Portugal

13. “An unborn child is not a disease. While medical professionals should certainly try to save a pregnant mother’s life, the means by which they do it can never be by directly killing her unborn child. The end does not justify the means.”

— Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix in a public statement confirming the excommunication of a woman religious for approving an abortion

14. “The pro-life issue has been framed in a more positive way, and people have begun to embrace the pro-life message. We’ve seen a corresponding increase in people who identity themselves as pro-life.”

— Sharron Angle, the (former) Republican candidate for the Senate in Nevada

15. “We need people who can explain the Catholic position simply and clearly — and who are ordinary people; who are teachers or lawyers or working in post offices or whatever — so that the listener will feel Now I understand and perhaps for the first time will see what the Church is saying.”

— Jack Valero, a coordinator of the Catholic Voices project in the U.K.

16. “In the Church, we have the most compelling and important story in the world. It will be extremely powerful once we are telling that story using the full capacity of the tools God has put at our disposal.”

— Blogger Matthew Warner on using new media for the New Evangelization

17.“If you didn’t know what she looked like, and you went to the convent and saw a bunch of nuns, you might not pick her out in the beginning. But if you paid attention and watched closely, you would start picking up little things that were very ordinary but done specially. For example, how she would make a genuflection or, say, taking the holy water when entering the chapel.”

— Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, the postulator of the cause of canonization of Mother Teresa of Calcutta, about the example of the blessed nun

18. “Though celibacy is a tough discernment for a young man, priests are by and large extremely happy and joyful. Contrary to the message of the media, celibate priests are some of the happiest men in the world.”

— Father Brett Brannen, author of To Save a Thousand Souls: A Guide for Discerning a Vocation to Diocesan Priesthood

19. “It became more and more evident that the Church had become the main sanctuary for moral reasoning and natural law, standing against the currents of relativism that were corroding almost all other institutions.”

— Hadley Arkes on his

conversion to Catholicism

20. “His goal for the Church was for Catholicism to rediscover its essence as an evangelical movement in history, the bride of the Lamb inviting the world to the Supper of the Lamb.”

— George Weigel on John Paul II’s papacy

21. “Having an abortion didn’t make me un-pregnant; it just made me the mother of a dead baby. That never goes away.”

— Tracie Rademacher, whose life was changed by 40 Days for Life

22. “We’re beginning to recognize in our midst we have very holy people, so the Church, in a sense, has come of age. The Holy Spirit has prepared the ground. In the saints we see the concrete working of the Holy Spirit. He’s the ‘Saint Maker.’”

— Father Andrew Apostoli, vice postulator for Archbishop Fulton Sheen’s

cause for canonization, about the ‘saint boom’ in the United States.

23. “Abortion is not just one issue among many. … If we fail to uphold life from the moment of conception, then the rest of our pro-life stance — which encompasses care for the sick and elderly, the poor and imprisoned, the handicapped, and all those who suffer, and opposition to the death penalty — lacks integrity.”

— Seattle Archbishop (then archbishop-elect) J. Peter Sartain

24.“He cared deeply about the well-being of this community and did everything he could to promote our commitment to Catholic wisdom.”

— Thomas Aquinas College’s

Brian Kelly on Marcus Berquist,

one of the college’s founders,

who passed away in November 2010

25. “The cross contains the message that God himself is someone who suffers, that through suffering he is fond of us, that he loves us. This is a message that attacks no one.”

— Pope Benedict in Light of the World

26. “This is a moment to reflect on the prophetic wisdom of Pope Benedict. It is a moment to thank him for his daring trust that Anglicans would respond. It is a time to intensify our prayers for him.”

— Archbishop John Hepworth

on the English ordinariate