Bernard Nathanson, a leading abortionist in the 1970s and later a convert to the pro-life cause, has passed away at the age of 84 following a long battle with cancer. Nathanson was born in New York City and graduated from the McGill University Faculty of Medicine in Montreal in 1949. As a member of the 12-person Planning Committee created by [...]
On Dec. 16, Patricia Marie Gerretsen (nee Doherty) passed away at the age of 69, leaving a legacy of pro-life involvement that went back decades and only increased after she suffered a debilitating anuerysm and stroke. Known as Pat to her pro-life friends but Patricia to her family, Gerretsen and her late husband Peter were involved in the pro-life cause [...]
On Dec. 3, a little more than a month after receiving LifeCanada`s Mother Teresa Award for outstanding pro-life activism, Heather Stilwell, a culture warrior and pro-life heroine, passed away after losing a two-year battle with breast cancer. While not unexpected, the news hit pro-lifers hard. Campaign Life Coalition national president Jim Hughes told The Interim that her death is the [...]
I am the proud possessor of a Bob Feller autographed baseball card. On reflection, however, my pride should be tempered for two reasons. According to certain knowledgeable collectors, there are more of his cards around sporting his signature than not. Feller, the former Cleveland Indians ace, has been most obliging at innumerable card shows. At 92 years young he has more post-induction [...]
Robert Edwards, the inventor of in vitro fertilization, was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine. In a press release, the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden declared that his discovery has brought “joy to infertile people all over the world.” The work of British physiologist Edwards, with the help of gynaecologist Patrick Steptoe, led to the [...]
Two leaders of the international pro-life movement, who have more than three-quarters of a century of pro-life experience between them, will be in Ottawa Oct. 28-30 for the Building a Global Culture of Life conference. Dr. Jack Willke, president of the International Right to Life Federation, began working in the pro-life movement in 1971. John Smeaton, national director of the Society for [...]
One of the speakers at the 2010 International Pro-Life Conferenc, Building a Global Culture of Life, will be Faytene Kryskow, an author and influential young speaker involved in full-time Christian ministry in Canada. She provides leadership for TheCRY Canada and the MYCanada Association. She told The Interim that “TheCRY mobilizes the church from across denominations and generations in full days [...]
Rita Burnie, who with her sisters Helen (deceased) and Mary, long served in the frontlines of the Canadian pro-life movement. She passed away last Dec. 13th. Burnie, a nurse, had been active in the pro-life movement since 1984 when she first picketed Morgentaler’s newly opened Toronto abortuary. “I went in to nursing to save lives,” Burnie is quoted as saying [...]
On Feb. 2, Toronto-area pro-lifer Rita Holmes, passed away in her 89th year. Rita had a perpetual dedication to her family – her husband Ray and sons Jim, David, and Bill, and daughters Lorie (Futch), Cathy (Roth), Honey (Ellerby), and Genevieve (Carson). She also had 26 grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren. Married for 67 years to Ray, her love, care and [...]
On Aug. 3, the National Post featured Linda Gibbons on its front page in what LifeSiteNews.com called “the largest piece on the pro-life heroine yet from Canada’s national media.” Religion reporter Charles Lewis interviewed Gibbons at the Vanier Centre for Women where Gibbons told the reporter she has a constitutionally protected right and religious obligation to witness against abortion. According [...]
Discussing freedom of speech on campus Editor’s Note: Paul Tuns, editor of The Interim, interviewed John Carpay, former executive director of the Canadian Constitution Foundation and who continues to the students involved with Campus Pro-life at the University of Calgary, about the case and freedom of speech on campus for pro-life groups in general. The Interim: How did you get involved with [...]
Organizers for the 2010 international pro-life conference have announced the list of individuals who will be speaking at the conference this October in Ottawa. Michael D. O’Brien, Canadian author and artist, will be joining Bill Saunders of Americans United for Life, John Smeaton of The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, and Brad Mattes, winner of a 2010 Emmy [...]
One of the many notable speakers at the 2010 International Pro-Life Conference will be Brad Mattes, host and executive producer of the Emmy-Award-winning television show Facing Life Head-On. In Facing Life Head-On, Mattes, who is also the executive director and co-founder of the Life Issues Institute, a Cincinnati-based organization that develops and distributes pro-life educational material, interviews people who were [...]
On July 17, Mary Florence Hughes, mother of pro-life leader Jim Hughes, passed away shortly after becoming seriously ill in her 101st year. Mary raised Jim and his sister Patricia on her own in Toronto in the 1940s and ‘50s, working a variety of jobs to support her own children and an extended family of cousins. Her husband Charles Hughes [...]
In July, the National March for Life committee announced Dan Heffernan as the newly appointed National March for Life coordinator for lay movements, a new position on the committee. Heffernan has had extensive involvement in the pro-life movement over the past few years. Joining the Knights of Columbus in 1988, Heffernan continued to hold various positions within the council, including [...]