This week two very important things happened. I’ll start with the first one.
On Wednesday, August 3, 2022, Indiana Congresswoman Jackie Walorski went to be with Jesus.
There is no doubt in anyone’s mind about that. She spoke openly of her relationship with Jesus Christ. She spoke in churches, giving her testimony. And, she and her husband spent four years of their married life in Romania as missionaries.
According to the Elkhart County sheriff's office, the most current information is that the SUV in which Jackie and two of her staff members were traveling crossed the center line and collided head-on with an oncoming vehicle. All the occupants of both cars died quickly from the grievous wounds they sustained in the crash.
I was heartbroken by the news. It didn’t help that Eric and I led the worship that night at church and Eric had picked out “Just a Closer Walk with Thee.” Thankfully, I could just mostly play my drum and not sing, because I could not sing the verse about “when this feeble life is o’er” without crying and I knew it.
President Trump offered his condolences on Truth Social and mentioned that she was a good friend. Immediately, vigilante Democrat trolls called him a liar because he probably had no idea who she was, and of course he couldn’t have been her friend.
But Jackie was everybody’s friend. She was very tall, and probably could almost look him in the eye. She was knowledgeable, intelligent, beautiful, and very energetic. I’ve never known any politician I liked as well.
People on social media have offered me condolences, saying they knew she was my friend because of what I posted. Again, if you just knew Jackie, she was your friend.
Jackie was a hugger. She just was.
In 2010, four of our kids, from Robyn on down to Vivian, were signed up for Student Action Teams (SAT’s) with Generation Joshua (GenJ)—an arm of Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA). We worked on Jackie’s first Congressional campaign that year, in South Bend*. That suited us just fine—it was our own district. I also brought several grandkids, who were a little too young for the job but could come as long as they stayed with Grandma. We only worked part of the time and then had to come home so I could work the polls in Liberty Township. Robyn took the grandkids on Sunday to see Jackie speak at the Delphi First Assembly instead of having them go to our own church, but she heard Jackie give her Christian testimony.
*Note for non-Hoosiers: South Bend is up north.
Joe Donnelly was our Congressman at the time, and he had presented himself as a “moderate Democrat” who was pro-life. We knew better and desired to see him ousted. We knew he was a corrupt politician, and it showed that year when his campaign pumped megabucks into the third party candidate’s campaign, which siphoned off potential voters for Jackie. The Libertarian garnered far more votes than he ever would have, advertising that he was the only true conservative in the race. Jackie lost by a slim 1% margin.
Fortunately for us, Donnelly had greater aspirations and he vacated his Congressional seat in 2012 so he could run for a fancier one in the Senate.
Then, as Senator, when it came to Obamacare, Donnelly was infamously part of a group of supposedly pro-life Democrats who held out against it because it would fund abortion. At the last minute, Donnelly caved along with the others, just like Joe Manchin with “Build Back Better,” betraying the pro-life cause and making socialist healthcare the law of the land. Obamacare did fund abortion—everywhere you looked. Donnelly only lasted one term as a U.S. Senator. The voters did not forget.
But with Donnelly out of the way, and after the Congressional districts were all rearranged, Jackie ran again in 2012 and the GenJ’ers were once again deployed to her campaign. Robyn was too old now, but I still had Valerie, David, and Vivian. At the same time, I was able to also bring with me four of Lisa’s kids: Jay, Joy, Sarah, and Abby. Our family unit was an entire team.
Shortly after we arrived, we were rerouted. It seemed some of the GenJ’ers who had been assigned to work for Governor Mike Pence’s reelection team had been no-show’s. So, since Governor Pence said in no uncertain terms that he needed his GenJ’ers, we went to Indy. How could we argue with the Governor?
Rather self-explanatory—That’s Mike Pence in the blue shirt.
We did campaign for him, and stood in line for the pizza that night… and the next day… until it became apparent that campaigning for Mike Pence meant a LOT of pizza. Meanwhile, the Walorski team was really short-handed. They just needed about 8-10 people. I said, “We are 8.” So we were pulled, along with a couple of teenage boys, and deployed back to South Bend in my pretty rusty van.
SAT’s are intense, very hard work, hours and hours of phone banking and lit (literature) drops. GenJ’ers are known for not doing the “walk lists” while walking, but by running. It’s a friendly competition—like “Team A made 2,021 phone contacts and 450 door knocks today. Team B only made 1,076 phone contacts and 437 door knocks. Team A wins the prize! Yay!” This last-minute GOTV (Get Out The Vote) effort is usually one week, including Election Day itself and any victory parties afterwards (that are decent and non-alcoholic). Nobody gets results like GenJ, a.k.a. “Teenage Mutant Ninja Campaigners.”
A particularly efficient GenJ’er, working two phones at the same time.
As a mom there among the troops, I tried to also keep an eye on the health of the kids in my charge. I had all the band-aids, cough drops, and such. I strongly advised some of them to cut back on the Mountain Dews and candy bars (which seemed to be unlimited and eternal). Some of the kids got sun-burned, some got chewed out on the phone and suffered mental anguish, and I got pushed down in the parking lot by an over-exuberant grandkid hugger. But that’s the hazards of war.
Above all of the normal GenJ experience and adrenaline, we knew in our hearts that Jackie was different. She was not just any old politician who was pretty good, at least better than the Democrat. Jackie was for real. And Jackie cared about us. Her mom, Martha, made us home cooked meals for dinner every day, and they were REALLY tasty meals.
Jackie checked up on us, bragged on us, talked with us about the issues, and hugged us. There was nothing as motivational as just seeing her walk through the door at campaign headquarters, pose with us for pictures, and give us high five’s.
Picture taken by Jackie herself, in Kokomo, with Robyn and grandkids above my head.
This was Jackie with all of us on the GenJ team in 2012. Somehow I always end up on the front row.
If we started to go stir-crazy from sitting too long at the phone bank, we did something crazy like standing on a major street corner and waving signs at the cars.
And then, on Election Night, we found out that Jackie had won, and we were pretty choked up about it. It finally worked! Praise the Lord!
The sights and sounds of the Victory Party are still fresh in my mind because I stumbled onto a video David took that night. Sarah was always the dancer grandkid and she had some good moves. Vivian and I got into the act too, when we could.
Yes, we were excited! But when Jackie showed up to the victory party and gave her acceptance speech, well, I won’t give you a cliché’ like “there was not a dry eye” but I know there were some tears.
Dear Jackie! Dear, dear Jackie! We were so honored to help you succeed Joe Donnelly! We knew that you were truly pro-life, and we so desperately needed you!
After campaigning, I was always invited to march with Jackie at parades via email, and I did once in Logansport since it was close. She was just as personable at a parade as anywhere else, and you loved doing it for her, no matter how sweaty you were or how tired you got from so much walking. And when she gave her first speech in Congress, we watched that.
Speaking of Congressional speeches, here was her speech in Congress on January 21 of this year: Don’t let anybody tell you she was a moderate. Click on the picture and listen to our Jackie!
A few months later, in May, a pro-abortion activist nearly ran over her as she was meeting with prolifers praying outside the abortion mill in her hometown.
Jackie won that night in 2012, but so also did Governor Pence, and another young man was re-elected: a homeschooler, who had spoken with the GenJ’ers in a training session and motivated us as well: Timothy Wesco had first won Jackie’s seat in the Indiana House of Representatives the year Jackie lost her race. When he first ran, it seemed like he was barely old enough to do it, and he came from a family even larger than ours. His whole family was there to cheer him on and so did Jackie. I know a few of our daughters had a crush on him too.
Jackie with Timothy Wesco
Now, the other important thing that happened this week was this:
On Friday night, August 5, 2022, Indiana became the first state in the nation to hold a special session and successfully enact an abortion ban after the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
The Indiana legislature was under a LOT of pressure and was very weary of folks on both sides who were making demands of them. But they got something passed and signed by Governor Holcomb, that will be a framework for bringing the abortion cartel in Indiana to a halt at last.
SB-1 was not a complete abortion ban—there are still some tweaks that should be made in the future: for instance, there don’t seem to be any meaningful punishments for transgressing the law. So, in the Indianapolis area, the word is, law enforcement doesn’t intend to enforce it. There are exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother, all of which can be interpreted broadly and allow for too many abortions. Some of this needs to be tightened, but it’s a better bill than when it started. Of course the media is quoting far more pro-abortion people and entities than pro-lifers.
The very good thing is, all abortion that come under the exceptions have to be done in a hospital or in a clinic affiliated with a hospital. That means, free-standing abortion mills, particularly Planned Parenthood ones, will have to close next month. That will be the answer to prayer we’ve been looking forward to for a long time.
So, we are rejoicing! God has done a wonderful work in Indiana. This time last year, we weren’t clear how He would do it, but we just prayed every day at 3:00 that God would shut down the Lafayette Planned Parenthood. Now, with the overturning of Roe v. Wade and this special session, He has shut down all of them!
Our dear Jackie would have loved to have seen this day…
Timothy Wesco wrote this poignant memorial on his Facebook page on Saturday:
“On July 1, I attended the grand opening of the beautiful new facility of RETA, a pregnancy resource center in Elkhart. I spotted my Congresswoman, Jackie Walorski and went over to greet her. She gave me a hug as she always did, and we talked enthusiastically about the recent Supreme Court Dobbs decision and the upcoming Special Session of the Indiana General Assembly. She then leaned in, and said to me, “Whatever you do, just shut down that abortion clinic in my district.”
“Yesterday, I resolutely voted for Senate Bill 1, which was passed by the Indiana General Assembly, and signed by the Governor.
“Senate Bill 1 will shut down the abortion clinic in South Bend.
“We did it, Jackie.”
Yes, we did it. This was a team effort. We needed Jackie in the Congress. We needed Timothy Wesco in the State House. Timothy needed his homeschooling family, and both of them needed my kids and grandkids in Generation Joshua to help them across the finish line. We needed Hoosier Amy Coney Barrett and her Notre Dame Law School training and experience. We needed President Trump to put ACB on the Supreme Court.
And when it was all said and done, we needed to know we had a network of unassuming but caring crisis pregnancy centers alive, growing, and flourishing, to care for all those moms who don’t know (because the abortion cartel wants them ignorant) that they have a real good option in giving birth to the child God has blessed them with.
So it was a long time in coming, but God knew His answer was on the way. It was just way too complex for Him to explain it to us. Everything had to be in place. We just needed to trust Him.
We had heard for so long: “The Bible says ‘If my people who are called by My Name will humble themselves and pray and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from Heaven, and will forgive, and I will heal their land.’ That means, Christians, it’s up to us! We need to pray!’”
And in my heart, I thought, “But we do, and we have been. How could we pray any more feverishly and effectively than we have been already?”
But He did hear. He really did!
That is not to say the work is over. The goal still is, to make abortion—not “safe legal, and rare,” which was lying rhetoric from the pro-aborts—but totally unheard of and unthinkable.
Ah, Lord, our hearts were heavy to lose such a great warrior in Congress. We do not understand Your plans, never have. But we know that this accident did not take You by surprise. We pray now for Jackie’s family, and for the families of Emma Thompson, Zach Potts, and Edith too, who was in the other car. Help them to find healing and comfort in You.
Show us who can fill Jackie’s shoes. That will be a very hard task, so the Republican leadership needs great wisdom.
And we pray that we as Christians would not stop doing pro-life work… ever. Help us make a difference in people’s lives by showing them Jesus.
It is in His Name we pray, Amen.
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