HIGHLAND — Catholics and other pro-life neighbors of goodwill in Ulster County and throughout the Hudson Valley are welcome to attend the annual Respect Life Mass sponsored by the Ulster Deanery Respect Life Committee (UDRLC), scheduled for Friday, October 25, at 5:30 p.m. at St. Augustine’s Church in Highland.

“Our annual Mass reminds us to ground our countywide pro-life efforts in prayer,” said Father Arthur Rojas, moderator and spiritual director of the UDRLC. Fr. Rojas added, “We are grateful to Father John Lynch, pastor of St. Augustine’s Church, for lending us the church as the venue.”

The Mass will be followed by the UDRLC’s annual Respect Life Dinner at 7 p.m. at Novellas restaurant in New Paltz. No tickets will be sold at the door as prior reservation are required. The guest speaker will be Chaplain Ayesha Kreutz, executive director of the Coalition to Protect Kids-NY, the statewide campaign opposing the Equal Rights Amendment (Proposal One, Prop 1) on the New York ballot on November 5. 

This year’s honoree is Anthony Pinque, a veteran pro-life activist from St. Mary-St. Andrew’s Church in Ellenville. The UDRLC has worked for months with the Coalition to Protect Kids-NY against Proposal One, with its aim of adding abortion rights and gender theory into the state constitution of New York.

The UDRLC coordinates pro-life activities of various Catholic parishes in the Ulster Deanery of the Archdiocese of New York, which is coterminous with Ulster County. The efforts of the UDRLC have included the issues of abortion and euthanasia, among others. The UDRLC’s growing profile in the pro-life movement in the Hudson Valley, including cooperation with non-Catholic groups such as the Bruderhof Communities, has led to its nickname as the “north star” of the Catholic pro-life movement in the Archdiocese of New York.