National Campus Life Network

National Campus Life Network is pleased to announce that we have hired additional staff for two new positions within the organization.  The new full-time Central Campus Coordinator will work directly with the Ontario campus clubs and the part-time Western Assistant will strengthen our Western Office. These positions will allow us to more effectively support the pro-life message on Canadian campuses and have a greater impact on Canadian campuses.

Clarissa Luluquisin, who graduated from the University of Toronto in 2011, will be taking on the new Central Campus Coordinator position.  As the former President of the U of T Students for Life, she is enthusiastic about her new role supporting students across the province.  Since graduation she has also been active in volunteering for Toronto Right to Life and NCLN.

Kathleen Dunn, a recent graduate from Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Academy, is our new Western Assistant, and will be working part-time in B.C. with Anastasia Pearse, our Western Campus Coordinator.  Kathleen was the President of the Academy’s Pro-Life club for the past two years and also assisted in the coordination of last year’s De-Fund Abortion Rally in Toronto.  A recording artist, she has performed for events across Canada, including the National March for Life.  This upcoming school year Kathleen will be studying Theology at Trinity Western University in Langley, B.C.

The Assistant position was created to support Anastasia Pearse, who, along with her position as Western Campus Coordinator, will be starting a Masters in Leadership at Trinity Western University.  The Masters in Leadership program will equip Anastasia to support the continued strategic growth of NCLN.

Your help is needed

Both new positions are dependent on successful fundraising on the part of the new staff, and Kathleen and Clarissa will be looking for individuals to join them in their work as part of their support teams.  Please consider joining their support team by making a donation today.  Your support will lead to a stronger pro-life presence on campuses across Canada!

Filmed at NCLN’s 4th Annual Life & Justice Pro-Life Student Dinner on May 10th.

The video pretty much speaks for itself.

Pro-Life Rally in Victoria to “Speak for Life.”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

On May 10th, Pro-Life British Columbians from across the province will march to the Legislature in the 5th Annual March for Life in Victoria.  With the abortion issue receiving such prominent attention in the media lately, organizers expect a large turnout this year.  This year’s theme, “SPEAK UP FOR LIFE,” challenges all British Columbians to raise their voice for the protection of the lives of the unborn.

Recent news stories about gender selection abortion and designer babies, and the current Parliamentary Motion calling for a committee to review the Criminal Code’s definition of a human being, have all drawn much needed attention to this issue. “The attention these issues have received, and polling data results, clearly show that Canadians are concerned by the complete lack of restrictions on abortion,” said March for Life media spokesperson, Anastasia Pearse.

“Our intention here today is to peacefully and prayerfully bring attention to the victims of abortion in our province,” she added. “We want to raise awareness and ask people to think before they choose abortion. They need to know the facts and be fully informed of all of the risks before they make these life changing decisions.”

The March for Life is organized to be a celebration of lives saved as well as a commemoration of lives lost. In BC, despite a severe lack of transparency in abortion record keeping, it is estimated that over 14,000 abortions are performed every year. “As tax-paying citizens, our money is being used to fund these abortions,” states Pearse. “We are marching today to speak out against this atrocity, to speak up for those 14,000 British Columbians who never had the chance to speak for themselves. We cannot remain silent when so many lives are at stake.”

This year’s March for Life is part of a national day of marches across the country. The BC March is co-sponsored by the Knights of Columbus BC & Yukon State and Campaign Life Coalition British Columbia. The March begins at 2:00pm in Centennial Square.

For more information, contact:

Anastasia Pearse,

March for Life Media Relations

westerncanada@ncln.ca

604-365-3484

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Canadian universities and colleges are in desperate need of the pro-life message. Not only is the university the place where the ideas, values and culture of our society take root, but it is also the demographic most vulnerable to abortion. Since 1997, National Campus Life Network (NCLN) has existed to support the pro-life message on Canadian campuses by educating, equipping, and empowering young men and women to build and sustain strong pro-life presences on campus and engage their student body as effectively as possible.

NCLN is now accepting applications for two staff positions and a summer internship program.  NCLN’s staff members are passionate and dynamic young adults who teach, support and connect pro-life university students across the country. If you are interested in an exciting, challenging and fulfilling career that is making a difference in Canada, one of these positions may be for you!

The Central Campus Coordinator is a full-time position in our Toronto office.  This is a new position, created to provide pro-life students across Ontario with more support in their pro-life efforts.  The new staff member will work directly with Ontario pro-life students with direction from the Executive Director.

Please click here for the Central Campus Coordinator job description.

The Assistant to the Western Campus Coordinator is a part-time position at 10 hours a week in our Vancouver office.  This position is ideal for students, particularly those who are interested in pursuing full-time work in the Pro-Life Movement after graduation.

Please click here for the Assistant to the Western Campus Coordinator job description.

Please note that the application deadline for both these positions is March 30, 2012.

We are also seeking applications from students for Summer Intern Positions, based out of our Vancouver, Toronto, and St John offices. This position offers students valuable opportunities to develop important communication, organization, and leadership skills. This would be achieved through their work on projects as well as through our Internship Development Program, which includes mentoring and a training and study program.

Please click here for Summer Intern Positions job description.

Please note that the application deadline for our summer internship positions is April 16th, 2012.

Some of our board and staff members at a February 2012 meeting.

March 14, 2012: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Ontario students want abortion debate but abortion advocates unwilling to defend their position

Toronto, ON: This March, two Ontario university clubs are hosting abortion debates on campus, but pro-choicers have been unwilling to debate.  Despite contacting over 120 professors, feminist organizations, and abortion advocacy groups, Guelph Life Choice and McMaster Lifeline have been unable to find anyone willing to debate.  Pro-life students from McMaster and Guelph are now issuing a public challenge to pro-choice proponents (specifically professors, doctors, clinic workers, and advocates from pro-choice organizations), inviting them to defend their position on abortion and join in an open and respectful debate.

“There’s been great student interest in having this debate,” states Hanna Barlow, President of the University of Guelph Life Choice.  “But everyone we’ve contacted to represent the pro-choice side has either rejected the invitation or simply ignored it.  It’s very disappointing.”

With the debate scheduled for the end of the month, Guelph Life Choice contacted the Student Help and Advocacy Centre (SHAC) from the student union for help finding a pro-choice advocate.  They declined, stating, “We do not believe that the sexual and reproductive rights of women is [sic] something that should be debated because we see ‘pro-choice’ as the only option. For us, reproductive rights are non-debatable.” (See full email text at: http://uofguelphlifechoice.ncln.ca/2012/03/14/email/)

“Unwillingness to debate is something we’ve seen before on other campuses,” states Rebecca Richmond, Executive Director for the National Campus Life Network, a national pro-life student organization.   “Despite accusations from pro-choicers that we’re closed minded and backwards, they are the ones who keep rejecting our offers to engage in dialogue.”

“Anyone who holds a belief on an issue must have evidence to back up their belief,” states Julia Bolzon, President of McMaster Lifeline.  “If pro-choicers are confident in their position, then they should be willing to defend it in a debate.  We hope pro-choicers will rise to the challenge.”

For more information or for those interested in representing the pro-choice side of the debate, contact:

Julia Bolzon – President McMaster Lifeline, 647 221 0912, jbolzon@gmail.com

Hanna Barlow – President Guelph Life Choice, 519 830 9072, hannabarlow@gmail.com

Rebecca Richmond – Executive Director, National Campus Life Network, 416 388 0461 director@ncln.ca

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By Rebecca Richmond

The Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada (ARCC) started a student project a few years ago called ‘Synergy’, or the Student and Youth Network for Reproductive Justice, and a post on their website caught my eye last week because the author made a number of points that I actually agreed with.  Surprising?  No, not really.

Consider that our two organizations, despite being on opposite sides of “reproductive justice” issues, exist for similar purposes. Both Synergy and NCLN exist to help network and support efforts across the country at the post-secondary level.  Naturally, both organizations believe strongly that the university environment is a critical place to promote our cause and both Tara Paterson, the article’s author, and I both emphasize the importance of being active on issues of injustice.

Tara, Synergy’s Student Network Coordinator and the Chair of the University of Victoria Students’ Society (not our favourite student union), points to the growing momentum of pro-life activities on university campuses (“hotbeds for anti-choice activities”) and the fact that, historically, activism on universities was a significant part of the pro-choice movement.  “The shift,” she writes, “from campus as a hub for pro-choice activity to one where anti-choice clubs monopolize a lot of student media and politics is worth noting.  We have a unique opportunity here to reclaim the campus as a site of political organizing for reproductive justice.”  So although I believe we are still far from “monopolizing” campuses, Tara and I both identify universities as critical ground to take in the fight for justice and human rights

Unfortunately, Tara failed to understand the purpose of some of the projects used on campus, such as those used by the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.  She also errs in her description of Carleton Lifeline’s lawsuit against the administration.  And I will not bother to address her laughable statement that, “the anti-choice lobby is a well-funded machine backed by right-wing bigwigs and the Catholic Church.” (But if anyone knows a right-wing bigwig with deep pockets and a hankering to support a worthy pro-life organization, please send them our way.)

But Tara is absolutely right to insist upon a pro-active stance when it comes to fighting injustice.  She calls pro-choice students to action.  As pro-lifers, we need to bear this in mind as well.  If our position on abortion is just that – simply a belief that abortion is wrong – then we will never end this atrocity in our country and we will never succeed in building a society that respects and affirms the value and dignity of every human life.  But if our respect for human life and our love of our fellow human beings flows into pro-life action, then consider the impact that would have!

And like Tara, we too should “grow our networks, hold events, share resources and otherwise inspire our campuses.”  We must continue and increase our activities.  Synergy may accuse us of ‘taking it upon ourselves to offend them’, but the reality is that abortion IS, itself, offensive because it takes the life of an innocent human being.   And while both Tara and I may share a passion for ‘justice’, we must root that justice in an objective morality that ensures that all human beings, regardless of their size, location, dependence or development, are given human rights.  Without this, Synergy’s call to action does not right an injustice, but, sadly deepens and perpetuates one.

We are now at capacity for the Life & Justice Dinner.  However, additional tickets may become available.  Please email director@ncln.ca or call 416 388 0461  for more information.

Join National Campus Life Network and students from all over to celebrate the accomplishments of the campus pro-life movement following the National March for Life in Ottawa on Thursday May 10th.

Full buffet dinner served.

Early bird ticket prices: $20.00 (students) $30.00 (non-students)

After April 30: $25.00 (students) $35.00 (non-students)

Tickets sales end on May 7th.

For organizations, please contact us for more information on a ticket and promotional booth package.

Tickets are available online and will NOT be available at the door. Tickets are limited so please purchase yours early.  Ticket sales will close on May 7th.   If you have concerns or questions, please contact us.

Featured Speaker:  Andrea Mrozek, Founder of ProWomanProLife.org

Please note: If you are looking for the Rose Dinner or the Rose Youth Dinner at the Hampton Inn, please visit Campaign Life Coalition’s website.  This dinner is separate and at a different location.

March 7th, 2012: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ABORTION DEBATE ON BC CAMPUSES

Vancouver, B.C. University pro-life clubs across British Columbia are bringing the abortion debate to their campuses in an unprecedented manner. Over the next week, six B.C. university campuses will be hosting multiple events, seeking to engage their peers on the issue of abortion.

“Our universities are places where ideas should be shared and contentious issues discussed,” states Anastasia Pearse, Western Campus Coordinator for the National Campus Life Network, a national pro-life student organization. “A recent CIHI report reveals that over a quarter of abortions are performed on university–aged students. If this is a choice young women are making, it is important that they consider what precisely they are choosing and know what abortion alternatives exist.”

Despite Prime Minister Harper’s repeated refusal to reopen the abortion debate in Parliament, pro-life student groups across the country have continued to be active on this issue, even amidst censorship and discrimination like that experienced most recently by Youth Protecting Youth at the University of Victoria.

Events include academic debates, resource distribution, information tables, and abortion imagery projects, all aimed at educating and engaging students in dialogue on the abortion issue. These clubs are also calling on their local politicians, asking them to bring the abortion debate to parliament.

Along with Canadian campus groups, others across the country are also working to raise awareness on the need to dialogue about abortion. Jakki Jeffs, director of Ontario’s We Want the Debate Campaign, has stated that, “the suppression of any debate in a democratic society is unacceptable.” The Alliance for Life of Ontario campaign is demanding that, “the current censorship of the debate around abortion be ended, and that an open and informed discussion be held in public.”

Abortion takes the lives of approximately 300 Canadian preborn human beings every day. Canadian pro-life students refuse to remain silent or be censored while such an injustice is occurring in our society.

Abortion Debates:
Capilano University: March 8th, 1:30 pm, Cedar Building Room 122
University of British Columbia: March 12th, 5:00pm, UBC-Woodward 1
University of the Fraser Valley: March 13th, 6:00pm, UFV Abbotsford Room B101
Simon Fraser University: March 14th, 6:00pm, SFU Burnaby, room TBA

For further information contact:
Anastasia Pearse Western Campus Coordinator, National Campus Life Network westerncanada@ncln.ca 604-365-3484

By Rebecca Richmond, NCLN Executive Director

(This post originally appeared in our weekly email for pro-life campus leaders: Campus Connections.  If you are a student and interested in joining our weekly email list, please contact your local NCLN staff member to be added!)

All I wanted was a coffee, but apparently the inundation of pink, red, flowers, hearts, and bare-bummed cupids was complimentary.  As if I could have missed the frenzied advertising leading up to today!

And while retailers celebrate record chocolate sales, we can take the opportunity to think about love.  As pro-lifers, love is, after all, at the core of who we are and what we do.  True love, that is, and not merely mushy, gushy, chocolate-filled, candy-coated sentiments.  Chocolates and candy hearts are nice and spending time with those we love is good, but we can best remember the self-sacrificing life of the day’s namesake by putting our heart into helping others each and every day.

Not much is known for certain about St. Valentine.  He was martyred for refusing to recant his beliefs and for assisting his Christian brethren during the persecution of the Church under the Emperor Claudius II in 269 A.D.   Yet this knowledge alone is enough, for it speaks of the true nature of love.

Love wants the highest good for the other person.  As such, love is not self-serving, but is oriented towards the other.  It is more than a onetime proclamation or commitment, but rather is revealed in our daily actions as we serve others.

Consider a mom with her baby.  Loving her baby doesn’t mean making a proclamation every now and again.  Loving her baby involves the everyday duties: feeding (even at obscene hours of the morning), cleaning, rocking, and playing.  It means sleepless nights and dirty diapers.

Similarly, our love of preborn children and the women and men facing unplanned pregnancies cannot be a simple avowal.  Our love must manifest itself in the everyday things we do and say: speaking up for Life in class, doing  the necessary tasks to host an abortion debate, staying strong even amid persecution from the student union, or having a  conversation with a  friend or family member.

Growing up, my parents often told me that love was a choice and not simply a feeling (this lesson probably saved my little brother from getting whacked over the head many a time….  It also probably saved me from his revenge when he surpassed me in height and strength).

So today, amid the swirl of chocolate-filled and candy-coated feelings, let us make choices.  Let us choose Life each and every day.  Let us love.

February 7, 2012: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

University of Victoria Pro-Life Club Censored Once Again

Victoria B.C.-The University of Victoria Student’s Society (UVSS) Board of Directors passed two motions to publicly censure the pro-life club on campus, Youth Protecting Youth (YPY) last night, February 6^th. The first motion was put forward in response to complaints stemming from an event the club held last November called “Choice” Chain and charged the students with violating the UVSS Harassment Policy. The second motion was passed in response to a poster the club put up on campus in October. As a result, YPY will be denied their ability to book public space on campus for their events and is forbidden to hold “Choice” Chain or other similar events. The club is also banned from putting up posters until a new policy is written by the UVSS to govern poster content. The board also ordered YPY to write a letter of apology to groups who were offended by the poster.

“Choice” Chain is a project developed by the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform (CCBR) and consists of volunteers holding three by four foot signs with graphic images of first trimester aborted fetuses. The volunteers engage passers-by in dialogue about abortion. More information about the project can be found here: http://www.unmaskingchoice.ca/projects/choicechain

“This is a disappointing development,” said Cameron Côté, YPY Vice-President and coordinator of the “Choice” Chain event. “People may have felt offended by the images but that in no way constitutes harassment. If you merely have to claim your feelings were hurt or you disliked someone’s message or way of expressing themselves to find that person guilty of harassment, freedom of speech ceases to exist. While we recognize that some people do not like our message, that doesn’t mean we should be censored.  ”

Campus Outreach Director for CCBR, Alanna Gomez, stated, “The charges of harassment have no grounds. There were no complaints made about the conduct of the students, because they acted respectfully and peacefully. The only complaints were based on the negative feelings people had because they didn’t like the pictures the students were holding. Just because someone doesn’t like a picture doesn’t mean they have been harassed, which is what the UVSS is trying to claim.”

The poster that resulted in the second motion was developed by National Campus Life Network (NCLN), and compares the current denial of legal personhood to the pre-born in Canada with similar treatment of other groups in the past. The poster can be viewed here: http://www.ncln.ca/resources/print-resources/person-poster/

“I thought the UVSS had moved past this type of discrimination and censorship since the settlement of YPY’s lawsuit in July 2010,” said Anastasia Pearse, former YPY president. Pearse currently works as the Western Campus Coordinator for NCLN. “Censorship of the abortion debate at a university is shameful and unacceptable.”

“YPY will not tolerate this ideological discrimination,” said Côté. “We must all demand that our   society be free of discrimination and censorship of minority or unpopular viewpoints. If there is a right not to be offended than we cannot have freedom of speech in this country or on campus.The legal killing of so many innocent human beings is a disturbing topic, but it is far too serious to suppress or ignore.”

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For further information:

Cameron Côté (YPY Vice President) – 778-678-4275, youthprotectingyouth@gmail.com

Alanna Gomez (CCBR Campus Outreach Director) – 403-690-5217, acampbell@unmaskingchoice.ca

Anastasia Pearse (NCLN Western Coordinator) – 604-365-3484, westerncanada@ncln.ca