Nov. 1, 2013 (UnmaskingChoice) – Gatekeeper -,kē-er: one that tends or guards a gate; a person who controls access.
We have been deeply encouraged by the number of gatekeepers we have met over the years who have opened wide the gates to a message that will not necessarily make their followers feel good, but it will make their followers be good.
Recently one such gatekeeper, a professor who teaches at a Canadian university, invited me to his class of students from different backgrounds and beliefs to present the pro-life case to his students. The results?
One student wrote, “Today's presentation and field trip made me realize how wrong abortion is, in my opinion. I use to think abortion was okay when the baby didn't have a heart or body parts but her analogies made me think otherwise; how all the baby needed was time and it does have a choice to life. Overall, the presentation blew my mind, I was really interested in what she had to say.”
Another said, “My heart is changed. I never thought that abortion would be that bad, for instance if you have reasons like what if you were a rape victim or having a baby would threaten a mother's life then maybe abortion is a solution but as she reasonably said that ending somebody else's life just to save someone is obviously not right. She explained everything that I have in mind.”
Afterwards the professor excitedly said to me, “You spoke to 60 students, but if each of those influence just 10 people, your reach from that one class was 600 alone.” He gets it.
So do others. At a high school in Alberta, a pregnant girl who heard our presentation chose adoption over abortion. At a high school in Ontario, two pregnant students also chose life for their babies following a presentation.
When gatekeepers open the gates, minds open as well. And lives get saved.
So what of the gatekeepers that close off access? It is a tragedy, one that has been a source of great pain and frustration over the years, but one that we’ve now learned to stop expending energy on and find a creative solution to. People have a limited quantity of energy, and it’s better to expend that energy walking through open gates, or up to unlocked ones that simply need opening, rather than to bang on those which are padlocked shut.
Why do some gatekeepers keep the gates sealed? More often than not we have found it’s because we bring images of abortion victims along with us—and some gatekeepers wish to keep the victims out. We’re not told our presentations are weak, or our presenters lack dynamism or charisma—not at all; in fact, we’re told just the opposite: that we have winning presentations given by engaging and gifted speakers.
“But the images of aborted children are disturbing,” some say. “Audience members may be troubled by what they see,” others comment. Well so they are, and so they may, but it’s not the aborted children’s fault that their deaths were so gruesome.
In such cases, when gatekeepers close the door it’s not to us—pre-born children’s advocates—but rather to the children themselves. Yet imagine having a presentation against drinking and driving and telling the survivor of such an accident that he isn’t welcome because his burned body is too disturbing. Or imagine having a Rwandan genocide machete victim, an amputee with a scarred face, refused access to an audience because her very presence, and that of her story, is too much for the comfort-loving crowd.
It’s difficult to imagine such intolerance, and yet that very attitude is alive and well when it comes to abortion victims. Unlike most other injustices, these victims cannot tell their own stories, and so it is the duty of the pro-life person to tell their stories for them, to be these children’s advocates.
The dictionary defines “advocate” as “one that pleads the cause of another.” What better way to plead their cause than to show their suffering? Pre-born children’s advocates would do well to remember the silent screams of aborted children cannot be heard, but their broken bodies can be seen—and those broken bodies cry out to people of conscience to rescue those being dragged to the slaughter.
When gatekeepers keep the broken bodies out, the babies’ advocates can take a lesson from the history books and instead of expending energy trying to get in, simply get creative in finding ways around the gate to reach the audience regardless. Consider my colleague Jonathon Van Maren’s recent reflection:
There was a tradition in pre-Christian Ireland known as troscadh, or what would now be referred to as a “hunger strike.” The victim would often prostrate him or herself on the doorstep of the perceived offender, and if justice was not given, the offender could be faced with one of the greatest dishonours imaginable—allowing someone to die on his doorstep. Abortion images show the broken, brutalized and prostrated corpses of the victims on our doorsteps, victims whose demise was purchased with tax dollars taken from our own wallets and permitted by our priorities. Many Christians look briefly down at the dead children on their doorstep, and then immediately with anger at the pro-lifers who are attempting to draw their attention to these poor orphans. How dare you, they ask, expose us and our children to such gruesome behavior?
Because, we reply, we cannot in good conscience allow you to sleepwalk through the greatest human carnage in all of history. The pre-born have the right to our defence. We may have failed the dead children in the pictures. But we can do our utmost to ensure that those pictures become a historical record, not a depiction of current events.
Taking the pro-life message directly to public sidewalks is a way to bypass gatekeepers, and a way to save lives. Consider what a young mom recently wrote on Facebook about our images:
“If I had never encountered these pictures, I would not have my two daughters with me today. I thank the ‘Choice’ Chain for helping me choose to keep my girls.”
Reprinted with permission from The Bridgehead.