Archive for the 'General' Category

A warm hello to everybody!
My name is Christina DeGoede, and I am one of the new guest bloggers who will be regularly posting some of my pro-life-related experiences, reflections, ideas, etc. on this website. I am very much looking forward to doing this and think that I will really enjoy it, and I am very grateful for the invitation to blog from Generations for Life. I love so much to be involved in pro-life work, and this will be a great way to share with you some of what this work means to me.

And let me tell you a little about myself. I live in Mossyrock, Washington; this is about two hours southeast of Seattle, Washington. I am 18 years old, and I just graduated from my high school studies in which I was homeschooled. My family and I first became actively involved in pro-life work when I was three years old, and again we have been actively involved for these past eight years.

I was especially excited about finishing my high school studies because I am very eager to organize and lead a new pro-life activism group. I will most probably start this group in my area. Just now, I am in the process of getting it all planned out.

Again, I look forward to posting on this website. And thank you all for any comments that you will write on my posts. I will always be interested in what your point of view is.

Take care everybody, and God bless!
Sincerely,
Christina DeGoede

We’ve recently invited three high school students we’ve been in contact with the past few months to be guest bloggers here on Generations for Life.

They will be introducing themselves soon, and they’ll write periodically about their reflections and insights on abortion and other life issues, personal experiences defending life, current pro-life news, events or activities their pro-life clubs are doing, etc.

Recently, we’ve gotten a lot of e-mails from high school and college students across the country who are looking for information on abortion for research papers and speeches they’re working on.

We expect this number to continue to grow in the next few weeks of December — a peak time for term papers.

When we receive e-mails like these, we first recommend that students check out our Q & A section.

We also offer to mail a complimentary pro-life literature packet.

If you would like one of these free student packets for yourself or for someone else, let us know through our contact form, and we’ll be happy to send you one.

In this week’s Stand True E-News, Bryan Kemper writes:

I look through a lot of web sites and MySpace sites every day. We get so many messages and invites and I love to see the creative ways people are spreading the pro-fie message.

One of the coolest things I see is the photos that people take and turn into pro-life banners and graphics. Some of these are very powerful and creative, and I know they make people think.

We want to see your creativity. We want to put your talents to work to help spread the pro-life message. So we are holding a pro-life photo and graphics contest.

Great idea!

Contest rules and prizes are listed here.

Last week we got an e-mail from Elizabeth, who is working on a project called Bella for Life. She writes:

We are using the movie Bella as a catalyst to raise awareness to the pro-life movement and the need for people to step up and become “lifeguards” to women in troubled pregnancies and their unborn babies.

The way it works is people contact Bella for Life, pledging to become a “lifeguard”. We then contact the Crisis Pregnancy Center in their area, letting them know of the volunteer(s). Then we exchange their contact information, helping them to create a time for volunteering.

Great idea!

There’s more information on how to become a “lifeguard” here.

**UPDATE: 8/9, 10:50AM: Wow! The number of T-shirt requests we’ve received has been overwhelming. We’ve gotten so many requests, in fact, that we have no more shirts left!

Kathy Piper, one of our longtime supporters, has made a generous donation of pro-life T-shirts to GFL. On the front, they say, “4-Life”, and on the back they say, “Choose Life! Your Mother Did!”

We’ve decided to make them available for FREE. If you’d like one (or more!), please contact us. Be sure to include your full name and mailing address, and also let us know what size you’d like — we have them available in medium, large, extra large, and double extra large.

Yesterday, Pope Benedict XVI traveled to Assisi to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the city’s favorite hometown hero, St. Francis.

During his eleven-hour trip, the pope gave five talks, including a beautiful address to a crowd of more than 25,000 young people gathered in the square surrounding the Porziuncola, the little church where Francis realized his vocation to serve God by living in poverty among the poor.

Here are some excerpts:

Saint Francis speaks to all men and women, but I know that he has a special attraction for young people. Your presence here in great numbers confirms this as do the questions you have put before me. His conversion took place at the prime of his life, of his experiences, of his dreams. He had spent twenty five years without ever having come to understand the meaning of life. A few months before his death, he will remember that period as a time when he was “in sin”

(more…)

We’ve been getting a lot of questions lately from students interested in finding pro-life internship opportunities. Thankfully, Students for Life of America has a long list of these opportunities on their website.

Check them out!

…which we recently got from Theresa, a high school senior:

I just wanted to say thank you for putting together the amazing Pro-Life Club Curriculum. Right now, I’m a senior at a very secular, very liberal high school, and for my AP Biology class we have to do a bioethics presentation. I have the topic of abortion as birth control. I kept putting off the assignment, because I did not know where to start. Then I remembered my mom had given me the Pro-Life Club Curriculum binder about a year ago, just for information. I spent a long time reading it. It is exactly the approach I need to take to present a persuasive argument to my class. It also solidified once again my pro-life stance. Thank you very much for your efforts in creating such a binder with every possible fact, rebuttal, and pro-life alternative.

And thank you, Theresa, for your compliments! God bless you!

We’ve gotten a couple of requests to advertise some upcoming events…

Erica Peralta of CFC-Youth for Christ has asked up to help spread the word about a youth retreat they’re sponsoring next month in the Chicago area. Here are the details:

CFC – Youth for Christ Spring 2007 Retreat

• When: Saturday, May 12 to Sunday, May 13
• Where: Cabrini Retreat Center, 9430 Golf Road, Des Plaines, IL
• Who: The retreat is open to anyone age 12 through college
• Registration Deadline: Friday, April 27
• Cost: $75.00 (Financial aid is available!)

Erica also provides some background information on CFC-Youth for Christ: (more…)

After several weeks of consultation with Annie and John, I’ve launched a different look for the Generations for Life website. As you can see, we’ve added some pictures across the top of the page, a new banner, and a colorful “Main Menu”. We’ve also simplified the organization of our main pages (the permanent content, as opposed to the blog).

We hope that these changes will help to highlight our mission at Generations for Life of helping teens to become pro-life leaders by establishing pro-life clubs as their schools and churches.

I’m still working on the coding for some of the features of the redesign. The menus on the left side of the screen will be modified soon such that only the items for the current section (blog, Q&A, etc.) appear there, making navigation a little clearer. Other elements of the page may change a bit over the coming week or two.

Comments on the new design are welcome.

**UPDATE: 4/24/08, 4:35pm: We’ve just found out that Lawrence Okorie is not who he claims to be. This document from the Archdiocese of Cincinnati verifies that he has been impersonating a priest: “It has been confirmed that Okorie is not a priest and he had previously been removed from a local seminary.”

Check out this beautiful article about a young priest from Cameroon named Father Lawrence Okorie.

Two years ago, Father Okorie founded Hope for Girls Ministries, a community that cares for nearly 100 pregnant teens, teenage mothers and their children, and orphans.

Father Okorie is currently visiting the United States to raise desperately needed funds to keep this new ministry going. Last Friday, I had the privilege of meeting him, as he attended the talk I gave to junior high students at St. Joseph’s Church in Joliet, IL. (more…)

Have you ever gotten into a discussion with someone about abortion and found yourself unsure what to say?

I know I have.

Knowing how to respond to the most common pro-abortion arguments is something every pro-lifer should be able to do. And it’s probably easier than you think.

This is what I’ll be explaining in a talk called “Defending Human Life Principles in a Modern Society” I’ll be giving next Friday, March 30, at St. Joseph Church in Joliet, IL. (more…)

One of the best things about being a dad is watching your children learn about the world. The things they say, the things they try, the things they do — their natural curiosity is an amazing thing. (more…)

As many of you already know, TeenSpeak 2007 was a great success! We had over 80 teens participate in a day filled with stimulating and informative talks, YouTube pro-life videos, and a superb lunch.

Vicki Thorn gave an excellent talk on the psychology behind why teens choose abortion. John Jansen talked about the problems with “comprehensive” sex ed, Eric Scheidler let us all in on what the pro-aborts are thinking and I ended the day with an inspiring talk on how to talk to about abortion. We hope that if you were unable to attend the event, you will order them. You won’t be disappointed.