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"Maggie has been key on Capitol
Hill, fighting for the right to life every day. As the
staff director for the House Pro-Life Caucus, she is
a valuable asset in the legislative process, indispensable
in the many legislative battles waged to protect life
in all of its stages - and equally critical in uncovering
and defeating duplicitous and bad legislation promoting
the culture of death," said Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ),
Chairman of the House Pro-Life Caucus.
Few people know the inside story of
national prolife politics better than Maggie Wynne (class
of 1983). Maggie is at the cutting edge of every piece
of prolife legislation that involves, or could involve,
the Federal government: Partial-birth abortion, human
embryo cloning, abortion funding for military personnel,
abortion requirements in block grants to the States
regarding child health, abortion funding for Federal
prisoners, abortion as a Federal employee health benefit,
abortion funding in aid to foreign countries, and banning
organizations that promote or fund abortions overseas.
Her job is to act as the conduit of
information between prolife and profamily groups and
various members of Congress on these issues. Keeping
a well-trod path to her door are representatives from
the Christian Coalition, National Right to Life, Family
Research Council, American Life League, and the U.S.
Catholic Conference, among others.
"You see the best and the worst
in people here," she said. "Many of the prolife
members of Congress are heartfelt believers in the sanctity
of human life, who actively live their Christian Faith.
But they are constantly assaulted for merely trying
to stop the most imaginative efforts to spread abortion.
There are few easy wins; lots of seemingly unanswered
prayers."
Maggie’s work has even put her
on the world stage, as when she attended the 1994 International
Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, Egypt
on behalf of the International Right to Life Foundation.
She spent time with some of the delegations from Latin
America and the Holy See, "decoding language for
the delegates, so they understood what was involved."
"For example, the term ‘reproductive rights,’"
she said, "does not mean what they thought it meant."
Since graduation from the College in
1983, Maggie has dedicated almost her entire life toward
the protection of the unborn on many different fronts.
For 11 years, she has weathered the sidewalks in front
of abortion clinics from Los Angeles, to Falls Church,
Virginia, often as a silent witness to horrific evil.
In 1995, she joined the board of a center which counsels
Hispanic pregnant women on alternatives to abortion.
Before her present assignment as Director
of the bi-partisan House Pro-life Caucus, which is co-chaired
by Congressman Smith and Jim Barcia (D-Mich.), Maggie
served, during the Bush Administration, as Director
of Public Policy for the National Committee for Adoption
(NCFA, now-called National Council for Adoption). At
the same time, in 1992, she obtained a Masters in Theological
Studies from the John Paul II Institute for Studies
on Marriage and the Family. From 1985 to 1990, she served
as Legislative Assistant to Rep. Tom Bliley (R-Va.),
where she was also engaged in monitoring life issues.
"The education I received at TAC,
and the ample opportunity for reasoned debate, have
proved invaluable both in my sidewalk counseling and
other prolife activities," she says. "Legal
abortion violates fundamental principles of what it
means to be a human being , a child of God , and the
sophistry used to defend it doesn’t withstand scrutiny."
Following graduation from the College,
Maggie taught 5th grade in Beverly Hills and then left
for Washington, D.C. where she also taught CCD for eight
years.
Maggie’s fondness for the College
endures. "The opportunities for spiritual growth
at TAC are endless, and, 15 years later, I still miss
living in a community where sacraments and other devotions
are readily available.
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