Focusing on preserving life - Eleventh Annual Life Chain, Fourth Annual Life Fair

Approximately 100 residents participated in the 11th Annual Life Chain and Fourth Annual Life Fair held January 21 at First Christian Church and along the west side of Mission Road between Fig and Ammunition.

Information was provided at the event relating to abortion, euthanasia, human cloning, stem cell research, disabilities and those issues that pertain to the “encouragement of life from natural beginning to natural end: God’s plan,” Phyllis Sweeney said.

The organization selected this year to receive the proceeds gathered from organizations distributing information at the event is the nonprofit corporation Garden of Angels.

Debi Faris-Cifelli, founder and director of Garden of Angels (1996), was the special guest speaker at the event. Faris-Cifelli and her staff dedicate their efforts to saving the lives of newborn babies and their mothers and providing a resting place for abandoned babies. She says she has considered it an “honor” to care for or bury the bodies of the abandoned and unclaimed children in the “Garden of Angels” at Desert Lawn Cemetery in Calimesa.

Faris-Cifelli is also responsible for the “Safe Arms for Newborns” law (SB 1368) that was activated on January 1, 2001. As of July 2006, 153 babies had been safely surrendered under this law.