OneLife LA 2024: Keynote Address

Most Reverend José H. Gomez
Archbishop of Los Angeles

Los Angeles State Historic Park
January 20, 2024

Greetings, my friends!

Thank you for coming today and it’s wonderful to be with you! What a joy it is to be together, to believe in Jesus Christ, and to celebrate his great gift of life!

We are joined today by brothers and sisters from all over the world and all over the country, so we want to say “thank you” to our media partners who are helping us to share the beautiful vision of OneLife LA. Let us especially recognize EWTN, El Sembrador, and Guadalupe Radio!

So today, we are celebrating 10 Years of OneLife LA! And I know that many of you have been with us since the very beginning. I’m grateful to all of you for your witness to the cause of life and human dignity.

My friends, OneLife LA has always been more than a just beautiful day, especially today that it is raining.

OneLife is a vision for a new way of living, a culture of life, a society where every life is sacred, and every life is cared for.

Every life! At every stage and in every condition. From the moment a person is conceived in the womb, until the moment that person’s life reaches its natural end.

Every human life is precious to God! And what God loves, we are called to love. And what God loves, we are called to defend.

This is our beautiful vision for OneLife LA!

So my dear friends, we need to keep going, always forward, keep working to defend the most innocent among us, the unborn child.

We also need to keep opening our hearts, ever wider, keep expanding the circle of our compassion, the circle of our care.

As we know, we face many big “issues” in our society. But behind every one of these “issues” are real people, with their own stories, their own dreams, their own struggles. Every one of them is a child of God, and every one of them is our brother or our sister.

And we are called to love them. As Jesus loves them. Without exception, without judgment, with no conditions. With all our hearts and all our strength.

Our vision presses on until every life matters and every life is considered sacred, until every person is welcome at the table of life.

So my friends,  we are a part of something much bigger than ourselves. We are a part of God’s beautiful vision for creation, the kingdom of love that he wants to bring on earth as it is in heaven.

OneLife is the vision of the world as God made it to be!

So, let us thank God today for the gift of our lives, for the gift of our families. And let us ask God for the grace and courage to keep doing our part to bring his beautiful vision to fulfillment.

Let’s keep going! Let’s keep pressing on for the beautiful cause of life!

And may Our Blessed Mother Mary, the Mother of God and the Mother of Life, keep you always close in the mantle of her love.