One of the central thrusts of Campaign Life Coalition’s election effort is to evaluate each candidate’s position on right to life issues. It’s a major task, involving the work of staff and volunteers from across the country.

The evaluation is based on candidate’s responses to a seven-item Campaign Life Coalition questionnaire. It forces our would-be leaders to declare their views on such questions as legal protection for the unborn from the moment of conception, the sale of the RU-486 abortion pill, abortion funding, doctor-assisted suicide and euthanasia. It also includes information from CLC files gleaned from interviews, speeches and correspondence.

While it’s certainly labor intensive, the survey forms a vital part of our election time strategy. The results are compiled into the Campaign Life Coalition Voter’s Guide (included with this issue of The Interim), to help voters form a stronger appreciation for the pro-life worthiness of candidates in their particular riding.

In many cases, the results are none too encouraging. Furthermore, the general public, which is not known to favor unrestricted abortion, seems to lack the motivation to nominate pro-life candidates.

Many Canadians are discovering – or have long lamented – that they really have little or no choice when it comes to supporting a pro-life candidate. This leaves many voters wit has serious dilemma – either abstaining (which is not helpful), writing “no pro-life choice” on the ballot, or voting for the least offensive candidate.

Whatever is chosen, it’s little consolation for voters who hope the electoral process might somehow allow expression of right to life views. It’s made worse when Liberals and New Democrats, seem to have gone out of their way to stifle pro-life voices in caucus and in the parties.

Certainly there are individual candidates with the Liberal, Progressive Conservative and Reform parties, who have courageously declared their pro-life commitment. These candidates have risked the displeasure of party leaders who stubbornly cling to values neutral (read pro-abortion) party policy, or who embrace referenda as a means of determining moral issues. Voters blessed with such candidates in their ridings will gladly dispense with party loyalty to support the candidate who best fits the pro-life bill.

Some pro-life voters can look to the Christian Heritage Party (CHP), which is fielding candidates in about 50 of the 300-plus ridings across the country. As the only officially pro-life party, the CHP offers a positive alternative to the standard fare.

The CHP regards human life as sacred from the moment of conception. It sees abortion as the deliberate killing of an innocent human beings and it calls for Criminal Code changes, which would recognize the personhood of all unborn children.

The CHP also refutes the single-issue party label. It has outlined a well-rounded platform that supporters believe is best in accord with the interests of the Canadian majority.

As one CHP supporter puts it, the CHP offers Canadians hope for a better future: “Without a party of principle, Canada, including her most helpless citizens, the preborn and the terminally ill, together with the cornerstone of society, the family, will be left without a future. It’s as simple as that.”

If the pro-life voters’ choices aren’t plentiful, at least we can take some comfort in the fact that legal protection for the unborn may be creeping into the wider public consciousness. Although pro-life issues were notably absent from the televised leaders debates in mid-May, there’s a perception that the question of personhood – of the unborn and the terminally ill- needs to be re-examined.

Regardless of the outcome of this election, perhaps we can build on this awareness to recreate a caring, pro-life community.