CAMBRIDGE -- As thousands traveled to Washington, D.C., for the annual March for Life, many Boston Catholics supported the pro-life cause with prayer by attending Holy Hours for Life held throughout the archdiocese from Jan. 18 to 25.

The annual holy hours are organized to coincide with the March for Life, and the national Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children on Jan. 22, the anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision in 1973.

"Roe v. Wade may have been overturned, but many, many hearts have not been converted," said Sylvia Fernandez del Castillo, director of the Archdiocese of Boston Pro-Life Office. "And we know that there are many, many people who are suffering from past abortions. We know many, many people who are devastated by the abortion situation."

She said that the pro-life movement's mission is now to support people affected by abortion, educate those on the fence, and change minds and hearts.

"Any pro-life effort has to be founded in prayer," Fernandez del Castillo said. "And we find that these holy hours are a wonderful opportunity to pray in reparation for the offenses that have been done to our Lord, to pray for help, for support, and in petition, and to honor the giver of life and ask for his help in this world that can be so difficult."

This year, Holy Hours for Life were held at St. John the Evangelist Parish in Beverly, St. Paul Parish in Cambridge, St. Stephen Parish in Framingham, St. Patrick Parish in Groveland, Sacred Heart Church in Lynn, St. Mary of the Annunciation Parish in Melrose, St. Theresa Church and St. Lucy Parish in Methuen, St. Joseph Parish in Needham, the Lazarus Center for Healing Shrine in Wakefield, St. Catherine of Alexandria Church in Westford, and St. John Chrysostom Parish in West Roxbury.

About a dozen people attended the holy hour at St. Paul's in Cambridge on Jan. 23, presided over by Deacon Tim O'Donnell. All holy hours in the archdiocese are presided over by deacons.

"It gives us the opportunity, really, to affirm the dignity of life and our prayer to change the culture," Deacon O'Donnell said, adding, "This is one of my deepest callings as a deacon. This prayer for the Church and for life."

Deacon O'Donnell led the assembly in prayer for mothers who had had abortions, fathers who lost their children to abortion, doctors and nurses, those experiencing thoughts of suicide, and for all the people of the world, that they may recognize the gift of life.

Parishioner Maryfrances Conrad said that adoration is "a time to be thankful and to get to know my Lord."

"If we don't have life, nothing else matters," she said.

Elke, who declined to give her last name, goes to the Holy Hour for Life every year.

"I think the protection of life from conception to natural death is one of our tenets of the faith," she said.

Fernandez del Castillo said that Jesus in the Eucharist is the giver of eternal life and that all pro-life efforts are ultimately through him.

"We go directly to the source of life, and we ask him to be with us," she said.

She hopes that in the future, Holy Hours for Life will take place in as many parishes as possible.

"Everybody is welcome to have one," she said. "And we hope that, the next year, we will have a very robust participation."