An anonymous donor has pledged $1,000 if we can get up to 1,000 pro-life fans on our fan page by August 31.  We already have 300 fans; we need 700 more.  Please do two things for us:

1. Simply go to our fan page (click here) and “Like” the page.
2. E-mail all your pro-life friends.  Ask them to “Like” the page and invite their pro-life friends to do the same.

But there’s more!  This donor has pledged another $1,000 for every additional 1,000 pro-life fans we can get by August 31, up to $5,000 for 5,000 fans!  Please do this.  It won’t cost you a thing, but it will mean so much to our work to save babies and moms on campus!  Let’s get 5,000 fans by August 31!

Here’s the Facebook link: www.facebook.com/ProLifeOnCampus

To add your own contribution to save babies and moms, click here!  (For your online donation to CBR/ProLifeOnCampus before August 31, you will receive a free pro-life gift!)

Tennessee Woman's Suffrage Memorial on Market Square. Note GAP display in background.

When we were on Market Square in Knoxville last week, we were stunned but pleased to see that the City of Knoxville had put up a monument to the pro-life position.  It wasn’t just pro-life, it was pro-family and pro-God.  It was awesome!

In fact, the pro-life monument has been there since 2006, but we enjoyed pretending that the City of Knoxville put it up just to endorse our message.

You all know about the pro-life convictions of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  Perhaps we could add Lizzie Crozier French (1851-1926) to that list.  She was the founder of the Knoxville Equal Suffrage Association.  She wrote these words that appeared on the monument:

Thanks be to God that in giving Woman the crown of motherhood He made her the giver not the taker of life.  Woman has no greater claim to the rights of the ballot than that she is the producer not a destroyer of life.

Young people learning the truth of abortion.

We displayed our Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) on Market Sqauare in Knoxville.  Here are comments from passersby:

“This is really plain. I have cancer and cannot have children. Why don’t these folks give birth and let people like me adopt?” (young couple from Kentucky)

“We have both seen the destruction of societies from the kind of ‘real’ genocide (the kind most people identify with). But abortion is no less a genocide. We are destroying our own children for selfish reasons. We have seen what a society is like when life is not valued and we do not want America to become like China.” (travelers recently returned from Africa and China)

“China has a one-child policy enforced by the State. America has a 2-child policy enforced by the Church. And the pastors’ refusal to talk about contraception, the ‘full quiver’ (God determining family size), and abortion. And the outcome is still the same . . . death to the preborn.” (male passerby)

“Thank you for being brave to put this truth up for all to see.” (male passerby) (Note: we appreciate the thanks and the admiration, but frankly, we’d rather have your help. Thanks and admiration by themselves will not buy new signs, new handouts, truck fuel, nor anything else.)

“It is so wrong that you cut the water off so children can’t play in the water fountains today.” (female restaurant employee)

“The pictures are just awful; you should be ashamed to put them up.” (male passerby)  (Note: When Lewis Hine showed photos of children working under abusive conditions, he said people would look at the photos and get more angry at him for showing the pictures than at the industrial bosses for abusing the children.)

“The people that took info from me were not really interested in talking but extremely engrossed in taking in every detail of the display, some slowly digesting every photo-mural. Polite and very contemplative are two words I would use for the older (than college age) crowd at Market Square. I did notice that there were very many who looked at the display intently from a distance, whether walking by or from the surrounding restaurants. I did speak with one UT college age male who was glad we were there and remembered us from UT. The Deeper Still table had several come by, and a few ask for information about their post-abortion healing ministry.” (CBR volunteer)

That’s what they say.  What do you say?  Please leave your comments!

ProLifeOnCampus Logo

You may have been wondering about the Pro Life on Campus logo.  This logo tells the simple story of what we are doing with our campus outreach project (GAP) at CBR:

Winning Hearts … Changing Minds … Saving Lives

These achievements are represented by the three icons that you see:

• The first is a heart, representing emotion.  Any salesman will tell you that the first step toward achieving behavior change is to touch the emotions of your audience.  They have to care about it; they have to think it’s important.  When people see our display, they are suddenly aware of a victim they had been taught to ignore (the defenseless baby) and an injustice they had been taught to trivialize.
• Next is a head, representing reason.  Using our display to start the conversation, we are able to engage the minds of students.  As pro-choice students and others repeat back the mantra of a pro-death culture, we ask questions to clarify the confusion in their minds.  We help them see that their justifications for abortion are no more compelling that the justifications given by the purveyors of slavery, the Holocaust, and the many other forms of systematic injustice.  They have been taught to hate these other forms of injustice; reason demands they hate abortion in the same way.
• Next is the baby’s hand, representing lives saved.  The first time I saw CBR’s campus outreach project was at the University of Tennessee in 1998.  We know of 9 babies lives that were saved.  One of them is now featured in a GAP sign that is shown all over the world.  Fr. Frank Pavone of Priests for Life says this project is “saving babies like nothing the pro-life movement has ever seen.”

The text on the logo, Pro Life on Campus, points people to our website, www.ProLifeOnCampus.com.  So now you know!

To win hearts, change minds, and save lives, we need your help!  If you click here and give $5 or more, I’ll send you a Precious Feet lapel pin!

"Wow, I think God really sent you to me."

We’ve been saying it for years.  Now, national pro-choice leaders agree.

The president of the pro-life student group at the U of California recently said, “Berkeley Students for Life hosted the most high-impact pro-life event our university has ever seen ….”  It was our Pro Life on Campus GAP display.  A public health class turned into a 2-hour discussion of abortion.  A professor told us said how “compelling” he thought our abortion pictures were.  A female student exclaimed, “Wow, I think [God] really sent you to me.  I say that because I’m pregnant.  I was actually considering abortion.”  We see these kinds of astounding reactions on every campus we visit.  That’s why the president of Students for Life at the U of New Hampshire told us,

“There is no doubt in my mind that GAP is the most effective pro-life project that any pro-life club can bring to their school.”

How effective?  Five years after CBR’s 1998 launch of GAP—it was the world’s first, large-scale, abortion photo outreach to students—the pro-abortion New York Times reported a shockingly pro-life opinion shift among students.  The article “Surprise Mom: I’m Anti-Abortion” (March 30, 2003) reported that the “… most commonly cited reason for the increasingly conservative views of young people is their receptiveness to the way anti-abortion campaigners have reframed the national debate on the contentious topic, shifting the emphasis from a woman’s rights to the rights of the fetus.”  It was our photos that “shifted the emphasis.”

Five years later, the Los Angeles Times published an even stronger affirmation of the power of CBR’s abortion photos.  “Abortion’s battle of messages” (January 22, 2008) was authored by Frances Kissling and Kate Michelman, two of the abortion industry’s most strident proponents of “reproductive choice.”  Ms. Kissling was president of “Catholics for Choice” and Ms. Michaelman was president of the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL – now “NARAL Pro-Choice America).  The authors made a startling admission:  “Advocates of choice have had a hard time dealing with the increased visibility of the fetus.”  Meaning the “fetus” they deceitfully dismissed as a blob of cells.  Even more amazingly, they concede that

“in recent years, the antiabortion movement [meaning CBR] successfully put the nitty-gritty details [meaning pictures] of abortion procedures on public display [meaning university campus exhibits], increasing the belief that abortion is serious business and that some societal involvement is appropriate.”

These pictures are precisely why our success with students continues to build.  Just last month, Newsweek published an article (“Saint Sarah”) that quoted a study conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.  That study revealed that 70% of “young, white evangelicals” want more restrictions on abortion, compared with only 55% in the “older generation.”

The one thing that pro-choicers and pro-lifers agree upon: Young attitudes are changing and the reason is our abortion photos!

Every year, we get far more requests for assistance than we can possibly handle, because we lack sufficient funds to visit more college campuses.  We struggle even to keep our current projects funded.  To make matters worse, this tough economy is increasing pressures to kill babies at the same time it is decreasing our ability to save them.  On behalf of babies and moms, we need your help.

I’m asking you to look at last month’s check register and/or credit card bills and see if you can’t find a place to cut ten (or even five) dollars you could begin sending to CBR on a monthly basis.  Only $10 a month will take our Pro Life on Campus display to 240 college students every year.  If you can afford cable TV ($40/month), an equal check to CBR will take our display to nearly 1,000 students every year.  Think about that.  Please act now.

Your willingness to live a little more modestly could enable you to give a little more generously.  The result could be a baby’s chance to live any life at all. Please save a baby’s life right now!

UW sophomore and GAP organizer Marc Snyder debates with a fellow student over issues raised by the organization's display in Red Square. (Photo from the Daily of the University of Washington)

CBR is at the University of Washington with our Genocide Awareness Project.  You can read the story in the student paper here.

I’m always amazed at some of the incoherent responses to GAP that I read in student newspapers.  I’m slow to blame the students who are quoted, however, for several reasons.  First, I can tell you from experience that journalists don’t always get the quotes right.  I’ve been badly misquoted in the past, not out of malice, but because of a lack of journalistic experience and skill.  Second, as any car salesman will tell you, so many people resort to emotions rather than reason.  (That’s one reason we must use pictures, in addition to reason, to present the pro-life message.)  Third, so many of these students have suffered from lack of diversity all their lives.  The university has exposed them to the full range of political thought in America, from far left to extreme far left.  They’ve never been required to read “right-wing” documents like the US Constitution, the Federalist Papers, or anything else that might lead them to question leftist thought.  They are encouraged to read only left-leaning publications like Newsweek, NY Times, or even the far-left Huffington Post.

At the bottom of the story, there is opportunity for readers to comment.  For commenter Benny, click here for an article detailing when the medical community (and even pro-choice philosophers) say that human life begins.

I had to laugh at the suggestion that we pay for our campus work with the proceeds of lawsuits.  (Who say’s pro-life work can’t be fun?!)  I can assure you that we get zero funding from lawsuits.  We need your help, now as much as ever.  If only 20 people support our work as faithfully as you support cable TV, we can visit one additional campus every year.  If you are not supporting our work monthly, please sign up for a monthly amount equal to your cable TV bill!  According to Fr. Pavone, you will be saving lives like nothing the pro-life movement has ever seen!

ProLifeOnCampus at Cal State Long Beach

CBR displayed the Genocide Awareness Project for two days at California State University at Long Beach for two days in May.  The photo to the right appeared on the front page of the student newspaper.  You can’t buy that kind of advertising!

Here’s the latest on our brave U of Calgary students who have now been found “guilty” of exercising their rights of free speech, while being denied the right of legal representation.  Depriving people their right of free speech, threatening to deny them the education for which they have qualified, and denying them legal representation (due process) is contemptable behavior by government officials that would be disallowed by any American court; but Canada is a country with the same contempt for disfavored speech that is commonly found in countries ruled by Asian Communist regimes.  Freedom-loving people all over the globe should be encouraged and inspired by these students.

In America, CBR defends the rights of students to conduct pro-life activities on campus, but we can’t do it without your help.  Please help us keep this from happening in America by supporting our work (click here).

Here’s the press release from the Canadian CBR:

CALGARY – The University of Calgary has notified eight members of the Campus Pro-Life (CPL) student group that they have been found guilty of a major violation under the Non-Academic Misconduct Policy regarding a pro-life display held last month. The verdict comes one week after the students each attended individual, closed-door hearings with an Associate Vice-Provost during which legal representatives were disallowed.
The verdict is “a formal written warning” that if the students “fail to comply with directives of Campus Security staff in the future” it will “result in more severe sanctions,” said Acting Associate Vice-Provost Meghan Houghton, who was the sole decision-maker in the guilty verdict.
“We are going to challenge this verdict,” stated Alanna Campbell, CPL President. “We did not break a single University bylaw or regulation and so we will defend ourselves accordingly. We will also not cease exercising our rights to free speech just because they’re threatening us.
I’d rather be expelled as a principled person than graduate a coward.”
Last month, after having set up a pro-life display on campus for the ninth time since 2006, members of the group were notified that they were being charged with a ‘Major Violation’ under Section 4.10 of the University of Calgary’s Non-Academic Misconduct Policy for “failure to comply with a Campus Security officer or University official in legitimate pursuit of his/her duties” when asked to turn their signs inward or leave campus.
In Houghton’s decision, she referenced the university’s demand that the students failed to comply with: “Signs that welcomed viewers and signs that identified your group as an anti-abortion display could remain outward facing but signs with the actual content of your display… must face away from walkways… or any other areas in which persons on campus would have little choice but to look at your display.”
“That’s blatant content-based discrimination,” said Peter Csillag, CPL Vice-President (Internal). “Why weren’t abortion advocates, or Falun Gong supporters, forced to place their messages inwards when they protested on campus? You can’t have debate if everyone is pointed inwards on themselves. As far as I’m concerned, this verdict against us pro-lifers is not legitimate, and it reveals U of C to be an institute of censorship and double standards—not of higher learning.”
In 2006 and 2007, during the first four displays of the Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) on campus, the University defended the students’ right to expression under the Charter, but in 2008 the University reversed its policy without explanation.
“This recent hearing and result is just another step in a long history of intimidation and censorship and if they think we’ll step down as the result of it then they’re sorely mistaken,” stated Cameron Wilson, CPL Vice-President (External).

If you are a pro-life student or pro-life group in America who is being denied equal access to your campus, its grounds, its facilities, etc. based on the content of your message, please contact us at CBR.  We can help you assess your situation and arrange for legal help, if needed.  Always obey the directives of your campus administration and police, because it is better to be a plaintiff in a civil rights action than to have to defend yourself against a trespassing charge.  But contact us immediately so that we begin the process of asserting your First-Amendment rights.

Please help us defend the rights of American students by supporting our work (click here).

The University of Calgary is moving ahead with proceedings against eight pro-life students who are being charged with tresspassing on their own campus.  Despite the fact that these proceedings could deprive these students of the same rights enjoyed by every other student on campus, they are being denied even the most basic right of legal representation.

It should be emphasized that if any public university in the USA were to attempt such blatant censorship and discrimination, they would be immediately be defending themselves in a Federal civil rights action.  And that university would lose.  As you pray for these students, you might also thank God that you live in a country where your most basic rights are protected by law, including the right of free speech and assembly.  Let’s work and sacrifice to keep it that way.  Here is the latest from the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform:

UNIVERSITY PROCEEDS TODAY WITH INDIVIDUAL, CLOSED-DOOR HEARINGS FOR PRO-LIFE STUDENTS, DISALLOWS LEGAL REPRESENTATIVES
The University of Calgary is proceeding with individual non-academic misconduct hearings, which include the possibility of expulsion, for eight members of the Campus Pro-Life (CPL) student group regarding a pro-life display held earlier this month. The University administration notified students that “legal representatives are not suitable Advisors and are not welcome” at the individual, closed-door hearings, scheduled for April 28th and April 30th.
“This feels like a show trial where they’ve already convicted us unjustly and now want to punish us unjustly,” said Alanna Campbell, CPL President.
Earlier this month, after having set up a pro-life display on campus for the ninth time since 2006, members of the group were notified that they were being charged with a ‘Major Violation’ under Section 4.10 of the University of Calgary’s Non-Academic Misconduct Policy for “failure to comply with a Campus Security officer or University official in legitimate pursuit of his/her duties.” In 2006 and 2007, during the first four displays of the Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) on campus, the University defended the students’ right to expression under the Charter, but in 2008 the University reversed its policy without explanation.
Two hearings will be held on April 28th, at 1:00pm and 1:30pm. The remaining six are scheduled throughout the day on Friday, April 30th with the first at 9:30am.
“We’ve never received an explanation for why the University reversed their position, nor have we received any explanation as to what a security official’s legitimate duties actually include,” stated Vice-President Peter Csillag.
The group’s pro-life display, called the Genocide Awareness Project, has been held on the University of Calgary grounds without incident eight times since 2006. The display compares abortion to past historical atrocities, such as the Rwandan genocide and the Holocaust in Nazi Germany.
“In exercising our freedom of expression rights, there is not a single University of Calgary bylaw or regulation broken,” said CPL Secretary Cristina Perri, “Obviously we’re going to challenge or appeal any adverse decision that comes from these or future hearings.”
In 2009, the University charged six students with trespassing in relation to the display, but the Crown Prosecutor stayed these charges prior to a trial scheduled for November of 2009.
In a statement to media on April 18th following notification of the Non-Academic Misconduct charges, CPL Vice-President (External) Cameron Wilson stated the Club’s position, “Our message to the University is this: do unto us whatever you desire, punish us however you wish; but our convictions shall not change, and we shall not alter our actions based on intimidation.”
For further information, contact Club President Alanna Campbell at (403) 690-5217, Vice-President (Internal) Peter Csillag at (403) 465-1777, or lawyer John Carpay of the Canadian Constitution Foundation at (403) 619-8014.

CBR recently took our Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) to the University of Delaware.  This was our second visit to this campus.  Click here to read the story in the student newspaper.

We are so grateful that we live in a country that respects freedom of speech.  Not so in some other places.  Like Canada!

We salute the pro-life students at the University of Calgary for their courageous stand against the heavy hand of censorship.   Story here.  It’s been widely covered in the popular press locally.  You can Google for the latest news.

Here is a press release issued by the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform:

CALGARY. April 19th, 2010 – The University of Calgary has notified eight of its own students that they are being charged with non-academic misconduct, with a possibility of expulsion, for having set up a pro-life display on campus earlier this month.
Campus Pro-Life (CPL) Club President Leah Hallman stated, “We understand the severity of the charges, but our consciences could not contemplate silence, therefore we must stand by our convictions to fight for the lives of unborn children.”
The group’s Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) display has been held on the University of Calgary grounds without incident eight times since 2006. The GAP display compares abortion to past historical atrocities, such as the Rwandan genocide and the Holocaust in Nazi Germany.
“They failed to convince the crown that we were trespassing on our own campus last year so now they want to charge us with ‘non-academic misconduct’ for exercising our right to express our views,” said Peter Csillag, CPL’s Vice-president. “We condemn and will challenge these charges, as we have with all previous attempts at censoring and intimidating us.”
In 2009, the University charged six students with trespassing in relation to the display, but the crown prosecutor stayed these charges prior to a trial scheduled for November of 2009. The University has threatened participating students with non-academic misconduct charges on the occasion of each display, but this is the first time they are following through with their threat.
“Quite frankly, I can’t help but feel like we’re living parts of the novel One Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovich,” stated Vice-president Cameron Wilson, “it feels almost surreal that we still have to fight this battle on our own campus.”
Campus Pro-Life will be holding a press conference at 10:00am on Monday, April 19th, 2010 outside of the MacKimmie Library Building on the University of Calgary campus to make a formal statement and answer questions pertaining to new developments.

I just got this note from Kristen Giesler, the president of Students for Life at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, the group that recently hosted GAP on that campus.

The most poignant thing about my recent GAP experience at UNC-Charlotte is how every facet of the event exceeded my expectations and was nothing like I imagined.  Assuredly, I did not anticipate having an unfettered debate with a history professor.  Said professor was a prime example of how ideology and emotion prevent logical thinking.  He threw at me the usual litany of pro-abortion fodder.  After giving him a logical (non-aggressive and non-emotional) response to every argument, the professor found himself talking in circles and moving on to ponder the logic of life.  This, just by itself, elated my spirits; but fate had a further dainty in store for me.  Just a few weeks later, we were again displaying abortion photos on the UNCC campus, and who should approach me but this same professor!  Unlike our first meeting, his demeanor had changed.  He wasn’t angry anymore.  More importantly, he no longer tried to defend the pro-abortion position.  I do not believe his heart has changed yet, but it was obvious that the seeds of life are growing in his heart and mind; change is inevitable!

A crowd gathers during class change at UNC Charlotte.

Every day’s a great day when you’re doing God’s work.  We took our ProLifeOnCampus display to UNC Charlotte (UNCC) earlier this month.  A grandmother taking classes at UNCC asked our White House volunteer Kathy Hardin for some extra brochures.  (Kathy is from White House in 10EC, not DC, for all you people in Rio Linda.)  She said her granddaughter had gotten pregnant and considered abortion but the grandmother told her not to do it if she expected any help from her.   The granddaughter is now 5 months along and keeps asking if she did the wrong thing by keeping the baby.  The grandmother said, “I want some pictures to show her what the wrong thing is!”  The next day the grandmother came back and asked for more brochures to show to the teens at her church, because she said everyone else pretends like none of them ever have abortions.  She said she wished she could bring everyone to see the pictures.

The Truth Truck passes the student center as Caleb displays a "Choice" sing and Abigail hands out pro-life literature. It's a triple whammy!

While the GAP display was set up at the Belk Tower in the middle of campus, our Truth Trucks, “Choice” signs, and educational brochure helped us project pro-life power (the power of the pictures) far beyond the display itself.  Both days during lunchtime, the Students for Life and the Hardin children (Caleb and Abigail) took four “Choice” signs and a hundreds of our “How can you compare abortion to genocide?” brochures down to the UNCC Student Center.  At the same time, our Truth Truck was circling the campus.  One student walked out of the Student Center, saw the signs and the trucks and the brochures and exclaimed, with a mixture of disgust and admiration, “They’re everywhere!”  Which is exactly where we want to be, by God’s grace and with your help.

Please help, because this is a tough economy and some have lost their jobs.  If you still have yours, would you give for yourself and for another?  Thank you so much.

Jana Tutkova, founder of CBR Slovakia, traveled to North Carolina to help this student learn how abortion denies rights of personhood.

We recently returned from taking our ProLifeOnCampus display in North Carolina.  We were invited to Western Carolina University (WCU) by the WCU College Republicans.  There’s currently no pro-life group on campus, but we’ll be working to start one.

Knoxville volunteer Debbie Picarello was able to share the love of Christ with many post-abortive women.  She also spoke with many nominally pro-life Christian students who became committed pro-lifers after being shocked and awed by our huge abortion photos.  They had never seen abortion in their pro-life churches, which explains why 1 in 5 women who abort their babies identifies herself as a “born-again” or “evangelical” Christian.

We also spoke with a number of pro-life students who are now interested in starting a new pro-life student group on campus.  Such groups can have a huge impact on public opinion among their fellow students.

Western Carolina is a major university, but it’s in a rural part of Western North Carolina.  We found few pro-lifers who were able to help us defray the costs of this visit.  Please consider a special gift of $50, $100, or $500 to help defray the costs of this campus visit.  Thanks.

ProLifeOnCampus at the University of Tennessee

I told you it was working.  Here’s yet more evidence.

Dr. Jon Shields of Claremont McKenna College, writing for The Witherspoon Institute, cites our campus outreach project (GAP) as an important causative factor in changing attitudes about abortion among Americans 18 to 29 years old. Click here for his column.

In his column, Dr. Shields cites an essay by political scientists Clyde Wilcox and Patrick Carr in Congressional Quarterly’s Understanding Public Opinion, in which they report that American 18-29 year-olds are not only “less pro-choice than any other age group,”  but “also markedly less pro-choice than [the 18-29 year-olds] in any previous decade.”

Citing these findings, Dr. Shields attributed the growing pro-life consensus among young Americans partly to

“an innovative and massive pro-life campaign on college campuses that has been organized by groups such as Justice for All and the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform.  Collectively both groups have visited well over 100 campuses (many more than once) and drawn large crowds thanks to huge displays of aborted embryos that they set up on university quads.  As I have found in my own research, such images clearly shock many of the students who pass by and draw many others into philosophical conversations with pro-life activists.  These efforts excite precisely the sort of tension between our common cultural belief in the special worth of human organisms and approval of permissive abortion laws.”

It’s working!  If you want us to do more of it, please click here to help me as generously as you can.  Only 20 people can send me and my team to a major college campus every year if they support us as faithfully as they support cable TV.  Please click here to help me and my team visit one more school where babies and moms really need us! 

More information:

• Barak Obama, Abortion, and the Democrats
• Shifting Attitudes on Abortion
• Generational Differences on Abortion Narrow
• Support for Abortion Slips