Poland-based Catholic group called Yes to Life Foundation has donated a huge church bell to Zambia as one of the activities aimed at discouraging abortion.
The Church Bell called Voice of the Unborn will come to the Cathedral of the Child Jesus in Lusaka and visit many Zambian towns.
Pope Francis blessed the bell on Wednesday during a ceremony attended by Lusaka Archbishop Alick Banda and Father Wojciech Lapczynski, a Polish priest, who has been working in Zambia for more than 30 years.
According to Vatican News, voice of the unborn bells are already in Poland, Ukraine and Ecuador.
The YES TO LIFE Foundation, headquartered in Poland, actively reminds people of the need to protect human life from conception to natural death, through various initiatives.
The Pope pointed out that the Voice of the Unborn Bells are a reminder of the need to protect life from conception to natural death.
“As a sign of the need to protect human life from conception to natural death, the Yes to Life Foundation is donating to Zambia the Voice of the Unborn, the bell I have blessed. May its sound carry the message that every life is sacred and inviolable,” Pope Francis said on 22nd March, during the general audience.
“Every year some 50 million children around the world are killed by abortion. This bell is meant to cry out for reflection, and for fewer and fewer of these abortions to occur each year,” stressed Vice President of the YES TO LIFE Foundation Bogdan Romaniuk.
Referring to the war in Ukraine and other armed conflicts around the world, Romaniuk reckoned that abortion bears the stigma of a crime analogous to war crimes against humanity.
They are four such bells created on the initiative of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary Foundation YES TO LIFE. The different destinations in the world they go to are not accidental.
So far, the “Voice of the unborn” bells are in Poland, Ukraine, Ecuador, and Zambia. France, Mexico, and Nicaragua have also expressed interest in having the bells.
Each time, the bells first resound in St. Peter’s Square symbolically set in motion by Pope Francis. “I think this bell is a spark that comes out of Poland and spreads to the whole world,” Bogdan Romaniuk said.
Bogdan Romaniuk noted that the blessing of the bell took place shortly before the Day for the Sanctity of Life, celebrated by the Church in Poland on the Feast of the Annunciation of the Lord on March 25. He also stressed that concern for life was close to the heart of St. John Paul II, the originator of the Day of the Sanctity of Life.
He spoke of it, for example, in his encyclical “Evangelium vitae”. “We, who grew up in the era of John Paul II’s pontificate, explored his message, can boldly say that this bell, this spark that pleads for life conceived, also flows from the teaching of St. John Paul II,” stressed the vice president of the YES LIFE Foundation.
The bell blessing ceremony on March 22, at the Paul VI Auditorium, was attended by Lusaka Archbishop Alick Banda and Father Wojciech Lapczynski, a Polish priest, who has been working in Zambia for more than 30 years, in addition to a delegation from the YES TO LIFE Foundation. The bell will travel to the Infant Jesus Cathedral in Lusaka and visit many Zambian towns and cities.
“We believe that this symbol will further carry the message that every life is sacred and inviolable,” Bogdan Romaniuk stressed.
The Przemysl-based bellmaker Jan Felczynski’s workshop created the newest “Voice of the Unborn,” like the previous ones.
The casting for Africa has a unique symbol of the Zambian and Polish bishop rings joined together, which commemorates the meeting of the clergy from the two countries.
The inscription reads: “Sign of the spiritual bond between the Roman Catholic Church in Zambia and Poland. Warsaw, May 17, 1970”.
The YES TO LIFE Foundation, headquartered in Rzeszow in southeastern Poland, actively reminds people of the need to protect human life from conception to natural death, through various initiatives. One of the most important is the project of the “Voice of the Unborn” bells.
