Pro-Life Witness, February 2009

We had the pro-life witness today as usual. Fr Saward unusually couldn't make it, but here we are:I was reminded of our witness when I saw protesters outside the Oxford laboratory where experiments are conducted on animals. The protesters appear every Thursday. They are videoed by the police, several of whom are present at all times. Animal rights protesters have made threats to University staff, and even blown up a University building (a sports pavilion, for some reason). They delayed the building of the laboratory by scaring off the contractors. When work resumed it took place behind enormous hoardings. I remember passing after some high winds had blown these down, and the builders were repairing them wearing masks.
Whatever sympathy I had with animal rights people evaporated long ago, in this context, and the same is true for people across the town and University.

The Pro-Life movement takes a very different approach, and we are frequently greeted in a friendly way by passers-by, though inevitably some are hostile. Abortion is naturally an emotive issue. What we are doing is not threatening or accusing, however, but simply witnessing to the tragedy of abortion, offering help to those who need it, and above all praying for its victims.

Please join us at the next witness:
3-4pm at St Anthony of Padua, Headley Way,
Saturday 28th March.