Saturday, October 27, 2007

National Pro-Life Conference: Day 2 (Part 3)

John Henry Westen, who runs the Life Site news, gave us the overview of the battle in the media. While most of us knew that the media is not favorable to the pro-life movement, not many could imagine that the disparity between the media and actual public opinion is that big. While 2 out of 3 Canadians believe there must be legal protection for human life during pregnancy, 9 out of 10 journalists support uncontrolled abortion, which Canada has now.

John gave us many examples how the mainstream media tries to portray pro-lifers as some sort of KKK extrimists; how he saw journalists walking around with the camera, purposely trying to leave all the young people out of the picture - so it looks like the pro-life movement has no appeal to the youth. But we've seen the great work John is doing with the Life Site News website. And we were glad to hear how a few devoted pro-lifers made the New York Times apologize for spreading lies about a woman who was allegedly jailed for having an abortion; how the truth and hard work helped to denounce the myth and expose the fact - that the woman was actually jailed for strangling a newborn.

Then Mary Ann Kuharsky told us how to raise pro-life children in an anti-life culture. Parents are the first missionaries of their kids, Mary Ann said. Pray together, play together, eat together, work together - those were the suggestions. Mary Ann emphasized the need of a child to be a team player, to know that this is his job around the house and if he doesn't do it - nobody else will.

Another thing Mary Ann mentioned is how inconsistent parents' message can often be. No parent would say something like "I don't want you to drive drunk, but if you do, at least try to drive where the cops aren't." Yet the advice on sexual behavior often sounds very similar to that. Mary Ann shared with us her own experience of raising 13 children, 6 of them adopted from all over the world. She told us how love and devotion helped her overcome the language barrier and many other challenges she was facing.

"Planned parenthood" doesn't believe in our children - we do, Mary Ann concluded. We expect great things from our children - "Planned Parenthood" doesn't.

I love you, I believe in you, I pray for you and I expect great things from you - that's the pro-Life approach.

Our next event was a prayer vigil at the Georges Dumont Hospital, to commemorate all the babies who've lost their lives in that hospital since it started performing abortions in July of 2006. We stood at both sides of the street, few feet apart from each other, holding our signs and praying, so it looked quite similar to the life chain. If someone had missed our message back then - he's got the chance to see it now. And the vast majority of the people were quite receptive.

(To be continued...)

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