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OTTAWA, Ontario, April 24, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Canada’s only national pro-life organization for college and university students has SOLD OUT of tickets for the upcoming 5th annual Life & Justice Student Dinner following the National March for Life in Ottawa. More than 160 people will be attending.

“Each year, the dinner continues to be a great opportunity for students from across the province to reconnect, look back at the work they have done on campuses over the semester, and be inspired to continue their work through the summer and into the next academic year,” said Rebecca Richmond, executive director of National Campus Life Network (NCLN), to LifeSiteNews.com.

The May 9 event features Brian Lilley of Sun News as the keynote speaker, as well as musical entertainment by Kathleen Dunn and Jesse Leblanc.

NCLN is the umbrella organization for 30 pro-life campus clubs across the country. It has been on the front lines of the culture war since its inception in 1997, battling many secular universities for attempting time after time to silence or stamp out campus pro-life clubs for their uncompromising life-affirming message.

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The organization is instrumental in getting the pro-life message out to a key intellectual battleground where the country’s future movers and shakers form deep seated ideas and values.

NCLN’s main goal is to promote as “objective truth” that “all human life is worthy of protection.” It does this by offering post-secondary pro-life students the education, networking, and support they need to make a pro-life difference on their campuses.

“We advocate [for] a world where everyone has a true right to life, even if they are labelled ‘defective’ or ‘unwanted'. Where everyone is valued for who they are, not for what they can do,” the organization states on its website.

In the last 6 months alone many of NCLN’s pro-life campus groups have experienced discrimination and censorship from student unions and university officials.

The pro-life group Protectores Vitae at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in B.C. was prepared to sue the university’s student union in November for rejecting its application to form a pro-life club on campus. The Kwantlen Student Association had attempted to block the formation of the pro-life club by rewriting its Club Procedures Policy. But the association backed down in the face of legal papers threatening a lawsuit.

Anastasia Pearse, NCLN’s western campus coordinator, said at that time: “This has not been the first time such discrimination against pro-life groups has happened on university campuses. We hope that other student associations will learn from Kwantlen’s example so that this won’t happen again.”

Trent Lifeline experienced a similar struggle in February when the Trent Central Student Association rejected its application to become an official club on grounds that such a club would be “exclusive”.

The University of Victoria abruptly cancelled an approved pro-life demonstration in February, one day before it was scheduled to take place. The university’s pro-life group Youth Protecting Youth was to host the ‘Choice’ Chain event, a large pro-life display that compares abortion to historical genocides. University administration cancelled the event over the technicality that UVic Student’s Society had once placed restrictions on the club’s activities.

Most recently administration at the University of the Fraser Valley cancelled an approved pro-life event a few days before it was to happen due to “security issues” and the “lack of a risk management plan.” The pro-life club Life Link threatened to sue the university for breaching its own rules.

Richmond said that in cases of discrimination and censorship, the NCLN “support[s] and assist[s] students in standing firm for their rights on campus, so that they can continue to be advocates for preborn children.”

Campus pro-life clubs have their work cut out for them. Statistics show that support for abortion in any circumstance doubles to 66 percent in young people who attend post-secondary education. Statistics Canada data shows that university aged women 18-29 years are having the majority of abortions.

Despite the many hurdles and obstacles Richmond said that pro-life campus clubs are making a difference in the lives of young men and women who will go on to influence the country’s future. “[L]ives are saved, hearts and minds [are] changed, and a culture [is] reformed,” she said.

“If they are not informed on critical life issues, how can they make appropriate decisions for our country?” she said.

NCLN will also be hosting a west coast dinner for the Victoria March for Life on May 9. The keynote speaker is Alexandra Jezierski, founder of the Letters 4 Life campaign that activated over 100,000 Canadians to write to the Prime Minister last year to support pro-life measures in the House of Commons last year.

Richmond said that although both east and west dinners will be “enjoyable and joyful events,” participants will not be leaving “without a reminder that we are the survivors of Canada's abortion regime.”

“We may have grown up in the shadow of the R. v. Morgentaler decision, but we will not abandon the next generation to the same fate,” she said.

The 2013 National March for Life takes place on May 9 with the theme: “It's a girl should not be a death sentence”.

 To be added to a waiting list for the Ottawa Life & Justice Student Dinner, contact Clarissa: [email protected]

 Purchase tickets for the Victoria March for Life Dinner here.