News

By Hilary White

WINNIPEG, Manitoba, October 10, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Canadian Catholic archdiocese of St. Boniface, Manitoba is advertising on their website a fundraising event for one of the world’s most prominent anti-Catholic abortion and condom campaigners. St. Boniface archdiocese is carrying an advert for the “Friends of Uganda, Stephen Lewis Fundraising Dinner,” to be held at the Winnipeg Convention Centre on Saturday, October 25.

Stephen Lewis, one of the world’s most vigorous campaigners for abortion and the use of condoms to stop the AIDS virus, will be speaking at the $100 per-person gala evening. The purpose of the event is to raise funds for more condoms to be spread in Uganda through the Stephen Lewis Foundation.

In 2005, the Stephen Lewis Foundation organized events in Uganda that raised US $50,000 to push the condom campaign in that country. The same year, he complained to the BBC that US policies that supported only abstinence campaigns were hampering UN efforts to bring still more condoms into Uganda.

At that time, Uganda’s indigenous “ABC” AIDS/HIV programs, which taught Ugandan young people that chastity and monogamous marriage were the best ways to curb the AIDS crisis, were being gutted by Western organisations that insisted on pressing condoms into the hands of Ugandan youth.

Martin Ssempa, Director of The Global Center for Uganda’s ABC Strategy, told LifeSiteNews.com that Lewis was one of the worst offenders, as the head of the UN’s AIDS commission.

“Mr. Lewis,” Ssempa said, “is using the entire body of the UN for his personal agenda of condomizing the developing nations. Why he has the audacity to fight the only nation which has demonstrated success in reducing HIV/AIDS is utterly beyond me.

Ssempa said that the UN and similar international AIDS groups are obsessed with condoms because they allow liberal Western attitudes towards sex, including abortion as a population control measure, to be injected into African societies. “Steve seems to have a problem with the Bush administration and is fabricating lies to further attack Uganda’s ABC strategy,” he added.

Lewis is a favourite within the St. Boniface diocese. Three years ago, St. Boniface Hospital awarded Lewis the prestigious International Award for his “work in the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa,” according to a press release from the Catholic hospital.

St. Boniface Archbishop Goulet refused to condemn the award outright or stop it, saying only that it was “unfortunate” that the granting of a Catholic award to Stephen Lewis “appears to have an ambiguous connotation.”

The archbishop, however, refrained from attending the award ceremony. Later, the archbishop told LifeSiteNews.com that the granting of awards ought to be done “respecting the moral principles and values of the Catholic Church.”

He said, “I am totally against abortion or anything against life and the doctrines of the Church.” Mrs. Maria Slykerman, president of Campaign Life Coalition Manitoba told LifeSiteNews.com that Archbishop Goulet had assured her of his intention to address the issue to the hospital board on which he sits.

To contact Archbishop Goulet,
  151 de la Cathédrale Avenue
  Saint Boniface, Manitoba
  R2H 0H6
  Phone: (204) 237-9851
  Fax: (204) 231-2652
[email protected]

Nuncio (Pope’s representative) in Canada
  Archbishop Luigi Ventura,
  Apostolic Nunciature
  724 Manor Avenue
  Ottawa, Ontario K1M 0E3
  Tel.: (613) 746-4914
  Fax: (613) 746-4786 

Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

  Catholic Award to Stephen Lewis Went Ahead without St Boniface Archbishop in Attendance
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/dec/05120603.html

St. Boniface Archbishop “Wiggling” with Ambiguous Statement on Stephen Lewis Award
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/nov/05112204.html

Ugandan Anti-AIDS Activist Demands UN Fire Lewis for Pushing Condoms
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/sep/05090701.html

The Tiny Mind of Stephen Lewis
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/dec/051206a.html