'People of Life' awards honor 4 pro-life advocates for leadership legacy

(OSV News) – The four pro-life advocates honored Aug. 11 at the annual "People of Life" awards built legacies for their work protesting outside abortion clinics, encouraging Black Catholic leaders for a culture of life, and opposing euthanasia and assisted suicide.

The awards were part of the Diocesan Pro-Life Leadership Conference sponsored by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Honored were Valerie Washington of Baltimore, executive director of the National Black Catholic Congress, Judy Haag of Eden Valley, Minnesota, and the late Rita and Mike Marker of Steubenville, Ohio.

Bishop Daniel E. Thomas of Toledo, Ohio, chair of the USCCB's Committee on Pro-Life Activities, and Bishop Michael F. Burbidge of Arlington, Virginia, presided at the private awards dinner, attended by about 100 pro-life leaders and guests.

The "People of Life" awards recognize Catholics who have answered the call outlined by St. John Paul II in his 1995 encyclical "Evangelium Vitae" ("The Gospel of Life") by dedicating themselves to pro-life activities and promoting respect for the dignity of the human person.

Washington, a former professor of biblical studies at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, has led the NBCC for 25 years, and was hailed in a USCCB news release on the awards for her "strong embrace of the pro-life cause."

The lay-driven NBCC has organized national congresses -- the first one going back to 1889 -- that gather thousands to celebrate faith, confront challenges, and uphold the rich faith traditions of Black Catholics. The next one is scheduled for 2028.

Under Washington's leadership, the pastoral plan of action that came out of the NBCC's Congress XI, held in Indianapolis in 2012, lamented "that more Black Catholics are not involved in pro-life advocacy," noting this advocacy's critical importance to preserve them as a people. It added that the NBCC strongly rejected "efforts by organizations and funders that seek to expand 'access' to abortion in minority communities," while also making clear the holistic approach the pro-life movement needed.

"We urge the national pro-life movement to embrace fully an inclusive, diverse, and comprehensive approach to life issues, which would attract more African American Catholics to this just cause," the NBCC's action plan stated.

Haag, a long-term care nurse for 30 years and a parishioner of Church of Our Lady in rural Manannah, Minnesota, served as chairperson of the New Ulm Diocesan Council of Catholic Women Reverence for Life Committee for several years.

She also has co-chaired her local 40 Days for Life campaign, which sponsors prayerful witness to the sanctity of life outside abortion clinics since its inception in 2007.

Explaining that 40 Days for Life is "definitely ... a Holy Spirit-inspired program" on the Minnesota Catholic podcast in 2019, Haag emphasized the importance of continuous prayer on sidewalks outside clinics.

"I think I always knew the power of prayer," she said. "It's just so real."

Of abortion clinics, she said, "There's something satanic that goes on there. People are not happy at their jobs."

Rita Marker, who died in 2024, and her husband Mike, who died in 2021, co-founded the International Anti-Euthanasia Task Force, later named the Patients Rights Council, in the mid-1980s. She headed the organization, which relied on small donations, until shortly before her death. In 2024, her organization dissolved and announced it was passing the baton to the New York-based Institute for Patients' Rights.

Equipped with a law degree from a correspondence law school, Rita, who also had a master's degree in music, made speeches and broadcast appearances nationwide to oppose assisted-suicide legislation while Mike, her husband of six decades, ran operations. After Ann Humphry, a co-founder of the Hemlock Society, contracted cancer and killed herself, Rita, who had befriended Humphry, wrote the 1995 book, "Deadly Compassion: The Death of Ann Humphry and the Truth About Euthanasia."

The Markers were members of Holy Family Parish in Steubenville.

According to the USCCB, the four awardees join 43 other men and women honored with the "People of Life" award since the USCCB Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities established the award in 2007.