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QUEBEC CITY, Quebec, May 3, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Quebec’s annual pro-life congress will take place in Quebec City this month, and will focus on the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace’s (D&P) documented support for pro-abortion partners and the efforts to reform the international development agency.

The event is being hosted by Campagne Québec-Vie. The keynote address will be by LifeSiteNews Editor John-Henry Westen and Campagne Québec-Vie President Georges Buscemi.

The congress takes place on the International Day of the Family, Sunday, May 15, 2011, with the theme: “Defending and Promoting the Family as The Sanctuary of Life: A Paramount Issue for Quebec.”

The goal of the congress, according to Campagne Québec-Vie, is to affirm the family as the source of life, the focus of a civil society, and the giver of freedom, in contrast to the social trends of increased abortion and contraception, radical individualism, and greater government involvement. 

In recent weeks, efforts have been made in Quebec by a group of Catholics supporting homosexuality and the “right” to abortion to quell any attempt at reforming D&P.  The group, under Catholic priest Rev. Claude Lacaille, has openly criticized Ottawa’s Archbishop Prendergast and Cornwall’s Bishop Paul-André Dorocher for cancelling events hosting Rev. Luis Arriaga last month.

Rev. Arriaga is the director of the Miguel Pro Centre for Human Rights (PRODH), a Mexican “human rights” group that Archbishop Prendergast had determined acts in ways “incompatible with the Church’s defence of the right to life from conception to natural death.”

Quebec’s Le Devoir newspaper recently highlighted and featured Rev. Lacaille and his efforts to reverse pro-life reforms at D&P.

In light of these events, Campagne Québec-Vie has chosen to focus on the development agency, with the congress keynote address entitled, “Development & Peace, Supporter for Agencies Promoting Abortion in Developing Nations: Proofs and Remedies.”

The congress will also feature former radical feminist, atheist, and lesbian, Brigitte Bédard, who experienced a dramatic conversion to Catholicism and touched the hearts of listeners at the congress last year.  Bédard, now married and a mother of six, is an independent journalist and has until recently contributed regularly to the periodical Nouvel Informateur Catholique.

Plenary sessions for the congress include speakers Richard Décarie, co-founder of the political action movement Action Conservatrice Traditionnelle; Solange Lefebvre-Pageau, director of the Center for Research and Education in Family Life (Quebec and African continent); and Gilles Noël, founder of faith-based political party Parti Démocratie Chrétienne du Québec.

In addition to the afternoon conferences, the congress includes an evening banquet to benefit the Marche Chrétienne (The Christian March), set for Quebec City on Saturday, June 4, 2011.

For more information on the congress, including a complete list of speakers and contact information, please visit the Campagne Québec-Vie website or Facebook page.