Bishop Andrew Cozzens addresses those gathered at Planned Parenthood in St. Paul in 2019 for the annual Good Friday Prayer Service for Life by Pro-Life Action Ministries.

Bishop Andrew Cozzens addresses those gathered at Planned Parenthood in St. Paul in 2019 for the annual Good Friday Prayer Service for Life by Pro-Life Action Ministries. DAVE HRBACEK | THE CATHOLIC SPIRIT

Bishop Andrew Cozzens has told his birth story many times — how his mother, Judy, when pregnant with him, was advised by her physician to get an abortion. Nancy Schulte Palacheck recently recalled that Judy told her doctor that God sends us whatever we can handle, that this was her baby and she was going to have the baby.

Schulte Palacheck, family and laity outreach coordinator for the Office of Marriage, Family and Life in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, believes Bishop Cozzens felt a calling to promote the pro-life cause at an early age, adding, “Look what (God) has done with him for all of us.”

For one, Schulte Palacheck said, Bishop Cozzens was instrumental in getting Minnesota’s “safe haven law” passed in 2000. It enables women to drop off their unwanted, unharmed babies at specified locations within seven days of their birth.

Sonya Flomo, an administrative assistant and the Life Fund grants administrator at the archdiocese, remembers meeting with then-Father Cozzens and two parishioners at the Cathedral of St. Paul in St. Paul to draft a mission statement for the proposed safe haven law. She said he worked tirelessly to ensure it passed so each child would be treated “the same way he was treated.” His mother trusted in God’s providence, she said, “and that’s exactly what he does.”

Flomo, who has worked with pro-life programs in the archdiocese for 24 years, said when people hear Bishop Cozzens’ story, their attitude changes and they see exactly why he’s the way he is.

“Prayer is the root of his being,” she said. “He’s a blessed child from God and he wants that for everybody.”

Schulte Palacheck said Bishop Cozzens is a huge proponent of natural family planning and regularly spoke to NFP teachers in the archdiocese to support them in their work, and explained to other audiences why the Church encourages its use.

Bishop Cozzens regularly participates in pro-life events, including the annual Prayer Service for Life at the Cathedral of St. Paul and accompanying pro-life march to the Minnesota Capitol. He has prayed at Planned Parenthood clinics, traveled every other year to the March for Life in Washington, D.C., and he spoke last January at a March for Life: Youth and Family Conference in St. Paul. He has been closely involved with the archdiocese’s annual St. John Paul II Champions for Life Awards.

Mary Jane Miller, a parishioner of St. Wenceslaus in New Prague who drove to Bishop Cozzens’ Mass of Thanksgiving in St. Paul Nov. 28, said she prays that the doctor who recommended abortion to his mother would see who this baby became. “If that isn’t a true miracle for anti-abortion (causes),” she said.

Bishop Cozzens also has blessed ultrasound machines at women’s clinics, including a machine recently received at the Alpha Women’s Center’s mobile medical center at Our Lady of the Prairie in Belle Blaine.

He has acted on his pro-life passion for many years. During a livestreamed conversation with young adults May 21, 2020, which included time for submitted questions, Bishop Cozzens said he was arrested six to eight times for civil disobedience during college for blocking the entrance to abortion clinics. He served time in jail for it.

“I would just like to thank Bishop Cozzens for his devotion to the pro-life cause, for his help leading and guiding our work,” Schulte Palacheck said.

‘Witness of our faith’

On a personal note, Nancy Schulte Palacheck recalled how Bishop Cozzens helped her family when her son, Clark, was diagnosed with cancer in July 2016 at age 24 and died at 25 in September 2017.

“He came to our home and met with my son,” Schulte Palacheck said. “He walked very closely with us and loved Clark, and described how our journey doesn’t end here, and how it begins in the next and how we need to prepare during this time.”

Bishop Cozzens heard her son’s last confession and officiated at his funeral Mass. She described the bishop as humble, loving, caring and kind. “He is a beautiful witness of our faith,” she said, drawing people and their hearts closer to Jesus in a loving and caring way.