Pro-Life Car Washes

Every so often you come accross an idea that when you discover it you say: "Why didn't somebody think of this before?" This is 1 of those ideas.

I was looking at the article list on townhall.com when I saw a column titled The pro-life generation? Naturally it caught my attention. So I began reading the article. The author, Kathryn Jean Lopez, was telling the story of an idea that Thomas Aquinas College student Jonathan Tonkowich came up with last Jan while daydreaming in a math class. He was thinking of something constructive he could do to promote the pro-life cause. What he came up with was an idea to raise funds for crisis pregnancy centers accross the USA & raise awareness of their existance. The idea, to organize "thousands of groups across the nation to hold car washes to benefit their local pregnancy care centers - all on the same day!"

He got together with some other pro-life students at the college to get this done. They spent their Summer getting this organized & spreading the word. They set the date of 16 Sept 2006 for it to happen. They set a goal of having "2000 groups, and to raise a collective total of $1,000,000." The money raised locally would go to a local crisis pregnancy center. Each group can designate it to meet a special need of the center. Or it can just be given to be used as the center sees best.

Why are they doing this? Why did they give up their Summer to get this going? In their own words: "We believe that our generation can help our country in powerful ways. America was not built by people sitting back and letting the government fix all our problems. Instead, it was built by people who took action and tried make a better community in which to live. We think that an important way to oppose abortion is by creating communities that love and care for women and children. The Wash for Life will help accomplish this by raising money for pregnancy care centers, by raising awareness about pregnancy care centers, and most importantly by proving that our generation cares about human life and is willing to support women who have unplanned pregnancies."

I work at a college. Much of the time I see the positive side of things. I see the caring that the students have for others, the willingness to help, to serve others to make the world a better place. But I sometimes see the negative side, those that give a bad name to all the students. & these are the ones that others usually (not always) bring up to me. Car Wash for Life will go a long way to counteract this image.

(Note: Even though the locally raised money stays in the community it came from, the national orginization does have some expenses. Go to their website for more info about the project as well as how to help them with their expenses. The address is listed below as well as in my pro-life links list.)

The article I read (I love the response from Planned Parenthood. It shows how much they fear events like this. This event scares them as it undermines much of the premises that they put out their to justify what they do.):

http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/KathrynJeanLopez/2006/09/01/the_pro-life_generation

Wash for Life Website:
http://www.washforlife.org/