A good hiatus, which I expect to blog about in the future. I was in Ukraine where I stayed at a transition home for young girls, some of whom came from the streets of Odessa, others from the Ukrainian orphanage system. Second week was spent running a summer camp in a small village. So much that I learned and saw and experienced that I hardly think I’ll ever be able to put those thoughts to paper.

But if I were to make any application for this blog it would be to say I learned (experientially, and not because someone preached it or told me) there are no unwanted children, only those we choose to label as unwanted.

It was good to be away. But now I’m back, and apparently, back to lots of abortion news. A huge article on Linda Gibbons in the National Post, which I’m sure you’ve already seen, and then the news today that Canadians are almost entirely unaware of what Canadian abortion law is.

This speaks to the apathy factor, which is, of course, much larger than the anti-abortion/pro-abortion camps combined. So onwards in engaging this apathy and the ongoing sympathy that exists toward abortion amongst really well meaning folks. Can’t believe it’s August. Back to work!

Friends, countrymen (and women), lend me your ear. PWPL is going on a summer holiday. It’s our first official break since we started in January 2008.

We shall return to our regularly scheduled blogging in August.

Check out this trailer for a new documentary about human trafficking. Coming soon.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEBbYhqKLKk”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEBbYhqKLKk]

And again at this. Actually, read it. This is a very fine column by one John Robson. However, it will be much funnier if you watch this first.

PETA’s latest ad campaign might not be able to run on the streets of Montreal. The trouble arises in that they’ve labelled female body parts as if they were pieces of meat. So the political correctness police are stepping out in full force because of the labelling. Because this might be sexist. Possibly even degrading? Now good old fashioned regular porn, up and down our city blocks–now that is clearly not degrading. The sex shops, the shady massage parlours, with all the forced labour, human trafficking, prostitution that implies–not a trouble! But this ad might be.

I’m desperately confused.

…then I can think of ways to help:

Couples struggling to conceive are about to get financial help from the Quebec government, as the province becomes the first jurisdiction in North America to pay for fertility treatments.  Health Minister Yves Bolduc announced Tuesday the launch of a provincial plan that will cover up to three cycles of in-vitro fertilization, starting on Aug. 5. Bolduc anticipates 3,500 fertilization cycles will be administered this year at a cost of more than $25 million. That figure could reach $63 million by 2013-2014. “It’s good for Quebec because it will increase the birth rate,” Bolduc said.

I expect a defunding of abortion to follow very, very shortly. Don’t all jump at once, now.

News that Bristol Palin and her once fiance, father of her child Levi are engaged is not like a soap opera.

I haven’t watched The Young and the Restless in years, but if I did, I’m pretty sure Victor would still be kicking around doing the same old thing. So really, Bristol Palin is moving too quickly.

Well, not quite. But this morning the medical minute on my local radio station (Ottawa’s 580 CFRA) was the Mayo Clinic announcing that parents can have tests done even earlier and less invasively for Down Syndrome. It’s effective, they say, 85 per cent of the time and allows parents to prepare and “make decisions.”

Given that we know that 90 per cent of Downs babies are aborted, what do you think “make decisions” means in this case?

When Rebecca and I wrote this piece about how the World Health Organization conjured up the 70,000 women dying from abortion, Joyce Arthur responded with this. I didn’t link to it yesterday because I thought it was very weak and borderline slanderous–an ad hominem attack in face of strong evidence.

Today, Rebecca and I respond with this letter to the editor in the Post:

Re: There’s No Dispute, Joyce Arthur, counterpoint, July 8.

Joyce Arthur, a devoted abortion advocate, takes us to task for questioning the methodology used to conjure up 70,000 deaths annually as the result of unsafe abortions. She should have taken up the issue of sound research with the authors of the studies she cites, for it is they who pepper their work with caveats, qualifiers and disclaimers. We merely quote their work.

Citing surveys of schoolchildren about whether they know someone who’s had post-abortion complications, as Ms. Arthur did in her piece, is baffling. We feel sure that a sizeable number of Canadian schoolchildren might claim to know a friend of a cousin whose stomach exploded after combining Coke and Pop Rocks. Shall we launch a worldwide campaign against junk food on the strength of those numbers? Schoolyard gossip and rumours do not constitute sound evidence.

More seriously, there is indeed an elephant in the room. It’s the number of women in the developing world who die from complications of pregnancy and childbirth. We know with certainty this number is much higher than abortion-related deaths. As we saw at the G8/G20 meetings, abortion was not the controversial topic activists thought it might be. The G8 leaders understood help for mothers in the developing world shouldn’t focus on abortion. Why can’t Joyce Arthur?

I don’t know her. But I stand up for her, because I have recently learned she is to be stoned to death for adultery in Iran. You can read about this horrifying situation here:

Ashtiani was originally condemned to 99 lashes, a sentence which was carried out in front of her 17-year-old son. Now, after re-examining her case, Iranian authorities have decided she should also be stoned to death.

To be clear, these maniacs want to throw rocks at this woman’s head until her brains are dashed out.

Treating people like this is evil. Regimes that do such things must be exposed, rattled and, at times, replaced. And in countries fortunate enough not to be subject to such brutality, we ought to recalibrate our priorities from cozy concerns like reality shows and “climate change” to the plight of our fellow human beings.

This struggle is cultural, psychological, military, and economic. Most of all, it is a test of wills. Do we have the strength to call evil by its name and resist, or will we fumble about and find reasons not to until it’s too late?

I pray it is not too late. For her life first and foremost, but also for ours if we fail to stand up against evil when called.

____________________

Update: Apparently they may not stone her. Though she still could be executed.