The St. Augustine young-adult ministry in the Miami metro area comes together for fellowship and has “Service Night” on Tuesday evenings – a time when the young adults work together to give back to their community. One Tuesday in early May, they decided to assemble gift bags for the twenty-four Sidewalk Advocates for Life teams across South Florida to give to abortion-vulnerable women.
Gift bags are a great tool for Sidewalk Advocates to initiate conversations with pregnant moms before they enter an abortion facility. Filled with life-affirming resources, pregnancy-care-center coupons, and self-care goodies, these small tokens help moms know that there are people who care about them and that abortion is not their only option. They serve as a simple way to quickly communicate our message: You are not alone, you are loved, and there is REAL help and hope available to you.
After a brief introduction to our outreach, the young people at St. Augustine not only helped prepare the sidewalk gift bags, they also wrote encouraging letters to the moms served on the sidewalk. “It was such a powerful night,” said Linda, SAFL Regional Programs Manager from the Miami area.
As a result of the students’ hard work and devotion, the young-adult ministry was able to assemble more than fifty gift bags. “This is a great opportunity for those that want to help on the sidewalk in some way,” says Linda. “They can … contribute to touching the hearts of many women and families in the darkest places of this community.”
As the legal battle for life continues in the state of Florida, Sidewalk Advocates, prayer volunteers, and many others – like the young-adult parishioners of St. Augustine – are doing their part to end abortion by changing hearts and minds. “We need lots of prayers,” says Linda. “With twenty-four abortion facilities in the Miami area, we need support and prayers for … courage and perseverance on the sidewalk.”
Learn more about how gift bags can help pave the way to a life-saving conversation in this Tips & Strategies video.