(LifeSiteNews) — The Catholic Resistance Conference, organized by the St. Boniface Institute (founded by Catholic activist Alexander Tschugguel) tackled the issue of abortion on several different levels last weekend.
From February 9 to February 11, over one hundred, mostly young, Catholics from all over Europe met in Vienna to network and listen to talks about the biggest evil of our time and how to fight back against it.
Among the speakers were Dr. Kathi Aultman, a former abortionist turned pro-life advocate, author and international speaker Gabriele Kuby, historian Charles Coulombe, Father Manfred Müller, and Tschugguel himself.
“This conference was created last year out of the idea that most Catholics are not aware that resistance to the evil … in the world is not possible alone in individual areas but is possible only if you understand the big picture,” Tschugguel told LifeSiteNews. “And the only way to understand the big picture is to understand that the only one who understands it is God, which means that only by looking at things through our faith can we, as Catholics, be able to do something close to what is necessary on earth.”
“The conference last year focused on creating this general understanding, and this year we focused on our core topic—which I think is a core topic for every Catholic—namely, to properly illuminate abortion from a Catholic perspective.”
“There are several aspects: we have dealt with abortion from a theological, philosophical, political, historical, ideological, modern ideological point of view and at the end from a practical point of view, meaning abortion in its physical execution.”
At the Catholic Resistance Conference #CRC2023 with the organizer and my friend @ATschugguel pic.twitter.com/2P88f5Oh9Y
— Andreas Wailzer (@Andreas_Wailzer) February 11, 2023
Dr. Aultman was the one to present this “physical execution,” a phrase befitting the murderous reality of abortion. Aultman showed the participants animated videos of different abortion procedures, some of which she had once carried out herself. Even though the former abortionist only showed cartoon animations, the viewers in the room groaned and looked with horror as they watched how unborn babies are slaughtered in their mother’s wombs.
Former abortionist Dr. Kathi Aultman spoke about her conversion story and how she became a pro-life advocte at #CRC2023 pic.twitter.com/WHJf4kAeGA
— Andreas Wailzer (@Andreas_Wailzer) February 11, 2023
Some may object to showing the gory details of abortion, and Aultman said that she used to be critical of it herself, even after her conversion. But she saw that many people who were pro-abortion became pro-life after watching these kinds of videos. When the brutal reality of abortion is veiled with euphemisms like “reproductive health” or “women’s rights,” it is easy to fall for the pro-abortion propaganda.
These videos leave little room for such euphemisms.
“We made up psychological reasons to justify the abortions,” Aultman told the audience. “I never did any for ‘medical reasons’.” This was a shocking admission by someone who carried out over 500 abortions in her career.
In another talk, Catholic author and speaker Gabriele Kuby stressed the importance of Christian anthropology for a civilized society.
Gabriele Kuby speaking at the #CRC2023 pic.twitter.com/gM0grMMXID
— Andreas Wailzer (@Andreas_Wailzer) February 10, 2023
“If we give up the idea that we are made in the image of God, we will lose human dignity, as we are seeing now in front of our eyes,” Kuby said. “If a society agrees they can kill unborn children, they can decide to kill anybody.”
A chilling realization, especially when you consider that 73 million abortions took place in 2021.
Father Manfred Müller, a member of the “Priests for Life” organization in Austria, addressed abortion from a theological perspective. “Abortion affects the whole body of the Church,” Müller stated.
“In short, the abortion industry is a perfect demonic system which offers a perverse form of worship to the devil,” the priest said, quoting a former president of Human Life International.
“In abortion, the victim is an innocent human being who is made in the image and likeness of God and who can never defend herself,” Müller explained.
“The combination of innocence, parental participation, and ritualized obliteration of the visage of God in human form is the devil’s way of blaspheming the Father with the misguided participation of God’s own children. The systematic destruction of the human body which St. Paul calls the temple of the Holy Spirit is a blasphemous insult to God. If the abortion business is not truly demonic, nothing is.”
READ: Abortion is a ‘Perfect demonic system’ says Human Life International President
Activist Clemens Wehler, who works for St. Boniface Institute, talked about the political dimension of abortion. He noted that even though Hungary did not, unfortunately, introduce any new pro-life law (except for a minor one recently: see here) the abortion rate was cut in half since Victor Orban’s Fidesz Party took power in 2010. This was, Wehler said, mainly due to the extensive pro-family policies that were introduced, which made it much easier financially for couples to have children.
Furthermore, Catholic author and historian Charles Coulombe talked about the history of abortion in Austria. The Habsburg Empress Maria Theresa, who had 16 children, was responsible for the strictest abortion law in the nation’s history, according to Coulombe. Under her rule, the penalty for abortion was capital punishment.
In the mid-nineteenth century, however, the first exceptions for cases of rape and incest were introduced. The ruler of Austria-Hungary, Emperor Francis Joseph I, was against the law as he saw it as a “slippery slope,” as Coulombe put it. The emperor was right, of course, and the Socialist party of Austria kept pushing for the liberalization of abortion laws in Austria ever since the fall of the Monarchy in 1918.
Finally, Tschugguel talked about the philosophical dimension of abortion. He emphasized the erroneous thinking of modern relativistic philosophies. Human freedom, Tschugguel explained, means that we can decide whether to act according to God’s law or not. We do not have the freedom, as relativists claim, to define what is right or wrong.
The Catholic activist said that “God has a plan for every human being, and you rob a child of its eternal fate, not only of its earthly fate” when you kill it through abortion.
Moreover, Tschugguel noted that the practice of euthanasia robs people not only of their life and the possibility to get better but also of the opportunity to suffer for Christ and the possibility to make reparations through this suffering.
After the main program of the Conference had ended, Tschugguel gave the participants a short historic tour through the old town of Vienna.
A highlight for many participants was the traditional Viennese Ball that took place Saturday night and was organized by the St. Boniface Institute. In the previous year, the St. Boniface Ball became somewhat famous for being the only (semi-illegal) Ball in Vienna that season, since all the other ones were canceled due to COVID restrictions.
The Catholic faith may seem all but gone in Europe sometimes, but there are signs that it is still alive and well in some corners. And from these corners, from these young pro-life Catholic families, with the help of God’s grace, the faith may spread throughout Europe once more.
