Leading Ladies is an exclusive Rhode Island Catholic series featuring local women — wonderfully pro-life — active in advocacy, peaceful and compassionate dialogue, all with a strong feminine voice in a culture that does not always speak for them.
Christina Frye used to be staunchly pro-choice, even when she considered herself to be a practicing Catholic. That all changed when she and her husband were presented with the option to have an abortion when she was in her first trimester of pregnancy with their first child, due to a likelihood that their child could be born with Down syndrome.
“While I had previously felt that women deserve the ‘right to choose’ when it came to abortion, I didn’t really know what an actual abortion was,” Frye explained. “While I adamantly refused abortion and gave birth to our child who does not have Down syndrome — not that it would have mattered to us — it led me to learn more about actual abortion procedures.”
With continued prayer and action, Frye feels that abortion will be a grave and sorrowful part of history one day. She shared that the best way to end abortion is to love, educate, empower and support mothers and fathers, and make everyone realize that abortion is never really necessary.
Frye felt that she became a mother the instant she and her husband saw the two little lines on the pregnancy test.
“That positive pregnancy test meant that I was a mother, my husband was a father and that little ball of cells, which was no bigger than a poppy seed, was our child. Likewise, with my current pregnancy with our second child, this sweet baby is already our baby. This revelation has translated to me having a fuller knowledge and appreciation of the fact that all humans are sacred and precious from the moment they are conceived until natural death.”
Frye is the founder of Catholic Mom Rhode Island, a community for local Catholic mothers to nurture, grow and support families and themselves through faith, hope and love. Her vision and goal for Catholic Mom Rhode Island is to have a mother’s group within every parish in the state, allowing for mothers to find fellowship and together fundraise for pro-life ministries and centers.
“It would also allow for women who are in crisis pregnancies to have a group to turn to in which they can find friendship, support and lean on one another,” she said.
In a culture that presents the Church within an “anti-woman” narrative, Frye feels that there is no religion which loves, respects, honors and treasures women more than the Catholic Church.
“Jesus Christ did not treat women inferior as it was customary in his time. The Gospels are proof of how Jesus ignored cultural norms and instead treated women with respect, dignity, tenderness and equal to men.”
Placing women as equal to men does not stop at Jesus, Frye explained, citing Saint John Paul II’s recognition of the “Feminine Genius” in his 1988 Apostolic letter “Mulieris Dignitatem” as well has his 1995 “Letter to Women,” in which he addresses the importance of women in the Catholic Church, family and world.
“He thanks mothers, wives, daughters, sisters, women who work, consecrated women, every woman. It is a beautiful piece that everyone, men and women should read.”
Abortion needs to be fought with prayer, penance, fasting and action, said Frye. She encouraged all those working for the cause to remain peaceful, even in times of adversary, as it may help to convert those who believe in abortion.
“If you have a tendency to become frustrated when discussing abortion, like I do, listen to or read the Prayer of Saint Francis also known as ‘Make Me a Channel of Your Peace’ before or while engaging in dialogue. Sometimes, the reason they are pro-choice could be like me — they don’t know what an abortion procedure actually does to a baby. Being angry or hostile could turn people away and can cripple our efforts to show those who favor the bill why we fight for the sanctity of life.”
To learn more about Catholic Mom Rhode Island, please visit www.catholicmomri.com.
