To begin, let me be clear: I am not here as a representative of my employer. I am here as a child of God, a citizen of this great country, and a resident of this vast province.
I have always been a political animal: someone who believes in personal liberty. And, I have always been a woman: one who encourages other women to think freely. But I have not always been pro-life.
There is a saintly man… A famed Canadian pro-life priest who witnesses to the sanctity of life on Parliament Hill every day that Parliament has sat since September of 1989. When I was 14 years old, on a school trip to our nation’s capital, I strayed from my class-crowd and struck up an antagonistic conversation with Fr. Van Hee. Well, less a conversation of any depth or meaning, more like a string of chants I had heard before, “Keep your rosaries out of my ovaries… You don’t have a uterus, you can’t tell me what to do with mine.” Fr. Van Hee, a slight man, stood over me quietly, patiently— until my teacher grabbed me, very nearly by the collar, placing me in line with my peers.
The second time I encountered Fr. Van Hee was last spring. This time, I towered over him. An outstretched hand at first, then a hug… I reminded him of our first meeting… I told him I had since seen the light of life. I apologized. He forgave me. I thanked him for praying for me— I know he did— we both had tears in our eyes.
A lot happened in those 10 years, but it’s too cold out here to cover everything.
Put simply, a growth in faith and exposure to facts revealed: All liberty depends on life.
Many think that if you support individual rights, free markets, and limited government, you should be “pro-choice.”
These views are flawed.
There is no right more basic than life. This fundamental right to life extends to the unborn, never mind that they are voiceless and defenseless (many children and elderly are, too). Abortion involves intentionally killing a helpless, innocent human being. And that is murder.
My friends, we live in a province— in a nation— that views murder as a constitutional right.
One that is justifies itself with an attitude that says, ‘If you don’t like abortion, don’t have one… Just pay for mine.’
Worse yet, generations of women are being educated to equate a right to murder their child, with their own liberty as a female. What rights do women have without life? None. All liberty depends on life.
But, make no mistake. Girls, grown women are fed a rich diet of the ‘my body, my choice’ mantra. (Er, it’s not just your body… The fetus has a different DNA structure and blood type, not to mention ultrasound abortions show a separate body within your womb backing away from the instrument that is about to cause it pain and eventually tear it apart, takes its life away…. But I digress.)
The opposing voice to this mantra — one that tries to educate young women, in truth, about their bodies, and the other body that is within them— the sanctity, the dignity, the LIFE within them both— that voice is now threatened within Ontario schools.
Ontario’s Education Minister recently called the pro-life stance ‘misogynistic’. “Bill 13 is about tackling misogyny,” she said. “Taking away a woman’s right to choose could arguably be one of the most misogynistic actions that one could take.” This has since stoked concerns that this Liberal government wants to dictate what Catholics can and cannot teach.
And, as a side note here, enough of this nonsense that life is a Catholics-only issue… Until recently, the two main strands of Western Civilization—Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian— agreed that abortion is wrong.
But, getting back to Education Minister Laurel Broten…
‘Misogynistic’… Really? What an ignorant thing to say. Either Minister Broten is ignorant of the meaning of the word— which alludes to being inspired by a hatred of women— or, she is ignorant of how abortion effects women, in which case she would be far from alone.
See, if you have not had an abortion or participated in one in some capacity, you may not have witnessed the direct effects of this holocaust— but we all experience it indirectly: a widening gap between childbearing and sex, and an expanding culture of death in which human life is less and less sacred…
But, woah! Hold my Heavenly horses… I don’t want to get too preachy before the good folks of our provincial legislature. So let me be clear…
Abortion, my friends, is a real war on women.
I know, I know, the word “choice” sounds friendly to me as the left-wing-fringe minority group member that I am, being a woman an all.
But, isn’t well-informed “choice” the best choice?
And since this isn’t an Ontario Catholic school micromanaged by pro-murder bureaucratic bullies, why not elucidate that choice now?
Abortions don’t just hurt the human whose life they end… Abortions hurt women who undergo the procedure.
According to Forbidden Grief: The Unspoken Pain of Abortion, 64% of women who had abortions report that they felt pressured to abort by others.
And as with any medical procedure, there are risks. The most common immediate and short-term risks include infection, failure to extract all “products of conception” (i.e. retained fetal or placental tissue), bleeding and even death.
And complications from an abortion may surface as many as 10 to15 years later. A survey of women conducted 15 years after their abortions found that 75% regretted having the abortion and by their own testimony, said they made the wrong choice. 65% of women experienced multiple symptoms of PTSD… And I haven’t even touched on the increased likelihood of breast cancer, ectopic pregnancies, uterine perforation (which can cause infertility), and the higher chance of future offspring being born prematurely (while cerebral palsy and other disabilities result from prematurity).
Further still, one authoritative study completed in Finland found that suicide rates associated with abortion are 6 times higher than the suicide rate associated with childbirth. That same study established women who undergo induced abortion experience a death rate nearly 4 times greater than women who give birth.
Friends, the promise of “safe and legal abortions” has failed.
For decades, women have not been told the truth about the development of the unborn child or the potential risk they face. Many who support the right of a woman to murder her own child have good intentions but are unaware of the risk these women will face.
There has, thus, been a war waged on women. One that seeks to keep her in the dark about the so-called choice she makes.
A choice to murder her child.
A choice to place her own health at risk.
And today, in Ontario, there is a threat to future generations as our education system suggest limitations be put upon disagreement with this culture of death…
Imagine: Pro-life teachings, against the law in Ontario’s new era of Bill 13…
How free is a nation where the freedom of speech for one is favoured over the freedom of speech for another simply because the one is more ‘comfortable’ to talk about?
As it stands, my government is taking my money to pay for murder, even though it violates my constitutional freedoms of religion and conscience. Now, my government wants to turn tax-funded schools— spaces where students ought to be exposed a wide range of ideas—into echo chambers. That, my friends, is not education. That is not freedom.
Today, I have come to our province’s legislature with a message—no matter how uncomfortable— for our premier….
Premier Kathleen Wynne: As Ontario’s first openly gay, female leader, I pray you do not find yourself confined by the false grouping, manufactured by the media and mainstream, that knots together issues of sexual orientation with matters of life and abortion. Outside of Scripture, these two issues have no common ground. Instead, I beg you to place woman’s rights at the forefront of your focus while in government. For, after all, women’s rights are human rights. And the first and most fundamental human right is the right to life.
Thank you.
