I’ve been doing 'Show the Truth' once a month, for almost two years and have frequently witnessed conversions on the faces of many of the people driving by these graphic images of aborted unwanted babies. The carefree looks on people's faces, before viewing these horrific pictures, transform into looks of shock and horror after seeing exactly what an abortion does to a baby in the womb at as early as ten weeks gestation.
The reactions frequently remind me of German civilians who were taken through the death camps immediately following the 2nd world war. The carefree expressions of these civilians, before witnessing the reality happening in their backyards, would turn to a look of shock and horror observing the multitude of bodies that were murdered by the Nazi's, in their neighbourhoods and right under their noses.
When the invitation came to expose the International pro-abortion conference on the island of P.E.I. scheduled for early August, I jumped at the opportunity to do more to end the culture of death and hopefully put a halt to attempts at establishing abortion on this island which is currently a sanctuary for life as the only province to proudly not have abortion.
The trek to P.E.I. was a grueling one. Two full days of travelling on a jam-packed bus, with not one empty seat and sleeping accommodations frequently being on the floor at night. The company of so many beautiful faith filled people surely compensated for the many inconveniences and I was later very touched to find out that more than 70 Christian Parishes on the Island of P.E.I. were praying for the success of our campaign.
The welcome we received on the first day at the University was certainly a foreshadowing of what was to come. The bus dropped some of us off by the entrance of the University and while waiting for the signs to arrive, we laughed because someone immediately blared their horn at us, gave us the one finger salute and we didn't even have our graphic signs with us yet.
That day the first few presentations went by with very little conflict beyond that which is normally expected. However, during the final presentation of the day, I just happened to glance around and witness an ominous looking fellow in a black leather jacket menacingly approaching the two young people behind me. I was shocked and screamed for someone to call 911 while this man proceeded to kick, then grab their sign, run with it and throw it over a fence.
I was pointing at the fellow while continuing my effort to garner the attention of someone with a phone, when he kicked and grabbed the sign my 13 year-old and I were holding. He continued up the line and to my relief, I heard sirens as he approached the intersection and was arrested. (link to the Guardian's article here) https://www.trurodaily.com/section/2014-08-08/article-3827683/Abortion-protest-in-Charlottetown-turns-violent/1
Often, we are accused of traumatizing children with these signs. I have never heard of an actual case of this happening and am growing weary of the phantom child argument. I witnessed these pro-life youth shaking and crying after this incident for what seemed like forever. To my dismay, the REAL and not imagined trauma to our children is often overlooked. However, the trauma our children experienced that day is nothing compared to the trauma babies experience in the womb.
Despite this experience fresh in my mind from the day before, the next day we battled on. In the afternoon however, my blood started boiling when an angry looking fellow with two dogs (they looked like pitbulls) approached us on the sidewalk, telling us to move because his dogs were aggressive and may just very well bite us. I responded to him that he'd better have good control over his dogs because he'd lose them if they did indeed bite us.
It seemed that the abortion activist University students were organizing themselves better via social media, because more of them were out that day with home made signs. One woman made a sign that said 'weird hobby' with an arrow pointing to us as she walked along beside us. Another fellow's sign simply said 'This sucks' and someone mimicked our written warning at the beginning of the line with a sign that said something to the effect of 'Warning: You are about to witness a lot of stupid people'. What could they possibly say to counter the unblemished truth of what our graphic signs were portraying?
By mid afternoon, carloads of what were obviously university students drove by, laughing and jeering at us, while affirming the counter protesters. The way they trivialized the seriousness of the subject at hand was utterly revolting. Students with homemade signs, began appearing out of the woodwork and I began to feel quite uncomfortable. I was perhaps extra sensitive because of the previous day's incident and the recent encounter with the dog walker.
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I glanced over at my 13 year-old daughter to see how she was doing and saw she had tears in her eyes. She expressed a desire to leave. I had enough. As three more university students came out from the residences, through the trees, I was ready to explode, and decided to let 'er rip.
With a slightly raised voice I remarked to them how sick it was that these University students could make light of a such a serious subject matter. I pointed to my graphic sign of a ten week old fetus and pointed out how it had all its fingers and toes, and said how sick it was they could laugh about the dismemberment of a little baby in the womb that even had fingernails. I also pointed across the street to the sad sign showing the abortion of a twenty week old fetus and remarked how you could see his/her eyeball through one of the slits in his eyelids.
I remarked how disturbing it must be for my young daughter to witness university students acting in such a callous and appalling manner and asked them how it must make her feel to be brought into such a sick uncaring world. To my surprise, in their compassion, they decided to engage me in a conversation. Early on, I couldn't be 100% sure, but it looked like the young fellow in the middle, was silently crying. I could see his lips quivering uncomfortably but immediately dismissed that thought as being delusional.
It turned out these University students were more pro-life than I thought but simply disagreed with our tactics. In response to why we needed to use these tactics, I asked them if they had heard of Linda Gibbons. They all responded negatively. I reported to them how the mainstream media has virtually ignored this post abortive woman who has spent more time in prison than Karla Homolka, simply for praying outside an abortuary in TO and counseling women on the other option to abortion. I remember repeating Linda's name at least three times in the course of the conversation and chastised them for not really caring enough about the subject matter because they weren't writing down Linda's name to do their own research.
From there we moved on to abortion in cases of rape. My response to them was that the majority of women who have been raped and had an abortion, find the abortion to be more traumatizing than the rape and suggested they do a little research of their own. To my relief, Vince, a retired H.S. chemistry teacher came over to join in on the conversation and proceeded to lead them into recognizing how the baby has it's own unique DNA which has been given to them at the moment of conception.
Several people after this presentation, remarked to me that the students I was talking to never did use those homemade signs after they left us. My suspicions about one of the students crying was confirmed. University students who were setting out to have a few hours of fun with their fellow students were visibly affected by these graphic signs and a brief conversation on the street.
This was only one of many incidents that happened in the Atlantic Provinces revealing how effective these graphic images can be. We heard from women who regretted their abortions and were able to recommend help, from a family who recalled our presence there 9 years ago and the effect it had in moving them to be more pro-actively pro-life and much more.
The final day in Halifax before heading home brought the most revealing opposition to our campaign. It was clear that CTV Atlantic news alerted the opposition about our plans to do a presentation in front of the hospital because they were out in full force that day. Our schedule was private and participants on the tour didn't even know when and where we were going. CTV Atlantic News had requested an interview and our organizer had suggested meeting us at the hospital the next morning. As soon as we arrived, one woman not only managed to vandalize our bus with purple paint but as the CTV news clip so aptly reported about the obscene and vile behaviour, one woman felt her best counter argument was to expose her buttocks. https://atlantic.ctvnews.ca/graphic-anti-abortion-posters-brochures-spark-outrage-in-halifax-1.1956937
In closing, this work is challenging but very rewarding and effective. It is my prayer that fellow pro-lifers will put their criticisms aside and will passionately join us in this battle for life. If you feel uncomfortable joining us, perhaps you would consider financially supporting future campaigns by going to www.showthetruth.ca and making a donation. Lastly, I humbly request that you consider joining us in watering with prayer, all the seeds we have planted over the last few weeks.