Finding cultural common ground in pro-life issues When you're navigating life's moral maelstroms, where do you find your anchor? This episode of Veil and Armor seeks to find the beacon in the fog, featuring Blaise Alleyne from the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform. Together, we steer through the tumultuous topics of abortion, euthanasia, and Canada's medically assisted suicide program, also known as (MAID). Blaise higlights the importance of genuine conversation as a suicide prevention tool, sharing how we can tap into our innate regard for human equality and human dignity to show the rational argument of the pro-life stance to people who oppose it. Blaise talks about secular apologetics, where he explores a path that connects through shared values rather than religious rhetoric. It's a journey that promises hope and the ability to shift perspectives with empathy and sound reasoning. He also calls out able-ism, age-ism, and a privileged mindset that is often overlooked in the debate about Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) program.
Blaise's inspiration: His mother, Julia Heartfelt stories often strike chords that reason alone cannot reach. In this broadcast, Blaise highlights his mother as his role model for sparking Blaise's inspiration in pro-life apologetics and his pro-life work. His mother, Julia, a sports physician, struggled through high-risk pregnancies. She was recommended abortion, however found a doctor who respected her pro-life conviction.
What is "Heart Apologetics"? Visuals can disrupt the status quo, as Blaise's blue mohawk hairstyle proves, demonstrating the impact of individuality in serious discourse. This episode reveals that a touch of whimsy can disarm heated debates, allowing us to reconstruct bridges over ideological divides. We delve into "Heart Apologetics," a method of advocacy that is not merely about winning arguments, but about winning hearts. It's about listening with the intent to understand, expressing truths with compassion, and presenting an inspired and compassionate perspective on hot-button issues of our time.
For more information on the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform and Blaise Alleyne's work, please visit: www.endthekilling.ca www.blaise.ca www.defendourvoice.ca
Our next episode: Speaking coach Emanuela Hall teaches women to speak boldly and confidently In the next episode, we will be speaking with Speaking Coach and Story Consultant Emanula Hall. The public speaking skills that Emanuela has mastered and is now teaching can sharpens one's skills for bold dialogue, and can encourage us to engage fearlessly with challenging topics. For all listeners, especially Catholic moms, this episode is an invitation to embrace bravery, boldness, and blessings as we continue our conversations and our vocation in motherhood with renewed hope, confidence and inspiration.
Please follow our Facebook/Meta page "Veil + Armour" and on Instagram @veilandarmour
Let's build a community of God-fearing, legacy-minded mothers raising leaders and saints!
We would love to hear your feedback about our podcast. Please feel free to send us a text message about what topics you would like us to cover. Buzzsprout has a feature called "Fan Mail" which allows listeners to send us a text message. Please click on the link above the Episode description. Thank you, God bless!
Finding cultural common ground in pro-life issues When you're navigating life's moral maelstroms, where do you find your anchor? This episode of Veil and Armor seeks to find the beacon in the fog, featuring Blaise Alleyne from the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform. Together, we steer through the tumultuous topics of abortion, euthanasia, and Canada's medically assisted suicide program, also known as (MAID). Blaise higlights the importance of genuine conversation as a suicide prevention tool, sharing how we can tap into our innate regard for human equality and human dignity to show the rational argument of the pro-life stance to people who oppose it. Blaise talks about secular apologetics, where he explores a path that connects through shared values rather than religious rhetoric. It's a journey that promises hope and the ability to shift perspectives with empathy and sound reasoning. He also calls out able-ism, age-ism, and a privileged mindset that is often overlooked in the debate about Canada's Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) program.
Blaise's inspiration: His mother, Julia Heartfelt stories often strike chords that reason alone cannot reach. In this broadcast, Blaise highlights his mother as his role model for sparking Blaise's inspiration in pro-life apologetics and his pro-life work. His mother, Julia, a sports physician, struggled through high-risk pregnancies. She was recommended abortion, however found a doctor who respected her pro-life conviction.
What is "Heart Apologetics"? Visuals can disrupt the status quo, as Blaise's blue mohawk hairstyle proves, demonstrating the impact of individuality in serious discourse. This episode reveals that a touch of whimsy can disarm heated debates, allowing us to reconstruct bridges over ideological divides. We delve into "Heart Apologetics," a method of advocacy that is not merely about winning arguments, but about winning hearts. It's about listening with the intent to understand, expressing truths with compassion, and presenting an inspired and compassionate perspective on hot-button issues of our time.
For more information on the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform and Blaise Alleyne's work, please visit: www.endthekilling.ca www.blaise.ca www.defendourvoice.ca
Our next episode: Speaking coach Emanuela Hall teaches women to speak boldly and confidently In the next episode, we will be speaking with Speaking Coach and Story Consultant Emanula Hall. The public speaking skills that Emanuela has mastered and is now teaching can sharpens one's skills for bold dialogue, and can encourage us to engage fearlessly with challenging topics. For all listeners, especially Catholic moms, this episode is an invitation to embrace bravery, boldness, and blessings as we continue our conversations and our vocation in motherhood with renewed hope, confidence and inspiration.
Please follow our Facebook/Meta page "Veil + Armour" and on Instagram @veilandarmour
Let's build a community of God-fearing, legacy-minded mothers raising leaders and saints!
We would love to hear your feedback about our podcast. Please feel free to send us a text message about what topics you would like us to cover. Buzzsprout has a feature called "Fan Mail" which allows listeners to send us a text message. Please click on the link above the Episode description. Thank you, God bless!
Hello and welcome to the Veil and Armour podcast. This is your host, Sheila Nonato. I'm a stay-at-home mom and a freelance Catholic journalist, Seeking the guidance of the Holy Spirit and the inspiration of Our Lady. I strive to tell stories that inspire, illuminate and enrich the lives of Catholic women, to help them in living out our vocation of raising the next generation of leaders and saints.
Blaise Alleyne:
Please join us every week on the Veil and Armour podcast, where stories come alive through a journalist's lens and mother's heart.
Sheila Nonato:
Welcome to Episode 8 of the Veil and Armour podcast. Today's guest is Blaise Alleyne. Blaise is part of the pro-life generation that our previous guest, Ramona Trevio from 40 Days for Life, had mentioned in Episode 5. Blaise is a millennial who merges his love of music, technology and pro-life work together as an organizer for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform. For the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform.
Sheila Nonato:
During the episode, Blaise talks about the positive influence his mother, Julia, had in inspiring him to advocate for life from conception to natural death. Before we listen to our conversation, I invite you to join me in a Hail Mary: In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Here is our conversation. Welcome to the podcast. We have Blaise Alleyne from the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform with us today. Can you please introduce yourself and what you do with CCBR?
Speaker 3:
Focused on educating the public to change hearts and minds on issues. Our primary focus is on the abortion issue, but I also do work on euthanasia and assisted suicide. So our goal is to go straight to the people with the pro-life message in a way that's persuasive and can change what people think so that people accept the pro-life message. And I am the Eastern Strategic Initiatives Director, so I'm responsible for a lot of our operations in Eastern Canada, from Ontario all the way to Newfoundland.
Sheila Nonato:
You were at St Ann's Catholic Parish in Hamilton a couple of weeks ago for a talk. What was the main message of your talk there?
Speaker 3:
So that presentation was on assisted suicide. It was on changing hearts and minds on assisted suicide. So I was sharing bad news and good news. The bad news is how far we've gone as a country with euthanasia and assisted suicide in such a short period of time, for nearly four per cent of non-abortion deaths, with a 30% increase year on year. There's almost 50,000 people who've gotten assistance from the government committing suicide. We've seen Canada hurtling down the slippery slope and the way that we treat people living with disabilities is terrible right now, and we're scheduled to expand to mental health reasons alone, although it's been delayed until 2027. That's the bad news, which is how far we've gone down the slippery slope so fast.
Speaker 3:
The good news is that we can make a case against assisted suicide that is persuasive. The key question we ask in any conversation we're trying to change someone's mind is how do you decide if someone gets suicide assistance or suicide prevention? Because these are opposite things and our society believes in both. And when we frame it as a suicide question, which is what it really is, a question about helping someone to end their own life, we tap in to the cultural common ground, a belief in suicide prevention, and we make the case for human equality, that everyone should have an equal right to suicide prevention, and we can talk through what that means for mental health reasons alone, for pain, for people living with disability or people living with terminal illness. But we can make the case that suicide prevention is always the answer and that we should never give in to suicidal despair, but that there is always hope for meaning and purpose in life. And there's a lot that we can do to alleviate pain and to journey with people, even in the face of unavoidable pain.
Speaker 3:
And when we've brought these arguments to the public in high school classrooms or on university campuses, we see people change their view on euthanasia and assisted suicide because they've never thought about it this way. They think about assisted suicide or medical aid in dying, as it's called a sort of euphemism. They think about it as this topic over here in the corner separate from their thoughts on mental health and suicide prevention. And if we can make the connection with what people already believe about mental health, suicide prevention make the case that suicide's the ultimate self-harm and being suicidal is always a symptom of some other unmet need, even for people with disabilities, even for the terminally ill, even for people dealing with chronic pain. We can tap into what they already believe and help to connect the dots and reframe the issue of euthanasia and suicide in their mind in a way that's persuasive to a lot of Canadians. That's the good news that we can change hearts and minds on the topic.
Sheila Nonato:
Just remembering your talk, you used the language of choice and the language of privilege that you called out ableism. Is this sort of a way of appealing to people who are not religious? Appealing through reason? Is that how we change the hearts and minds of people?
Speaker 3:
Absolutely. Our focus in apologetics is to take a secular approach to the apologetics, to speak in secular approach to the apologetics, to speak in a way that can resonate with people of any faith or of no faith at all. I'm a Catholic and I think there's a lot that our Catholic faith can tell us at a deeper and richer level about the topic. But when we're engaged in apologetics and trying to reach the average Canadian, we're looking for the most efficient way to find common ground and make a connection. So, rather than trying to bring about an entire worldview change in a conversation on assisted suicide, we're trying to connect with what people already believe. That is true regardless of their broader worldview and whether or not they're a person of faith. When we tap into this what I call cultural common ground right beliefs that people already have that we share in common whether that's a belief in suicide prevention, a belief in human equality, that is, a belief that ableism is wrong, that discriminating against people with disabilities, especially denying them an equal right to suicide prevention, that this is wrong and that there's something unjust about that sort of ableism, or a kind of ageism as well, that we see with assisted suicide and when we tap into those beliefs that people already hold. We can show them that assisted suicide is wrong, based on moral beliefs they already hold that maybe they haven't thought about together. Like, people often think about assisted suicide as if it's compassionate for people living with disabilities. When we can ask a few simple questions to help them to see the issue in a different light, see it more accurately, to see that hold on a second. If an able-bodied person we give suicide prevention, but a person with a disability, suddenly we're talking about assisting their suicide. Like how would that feel living with a disability? That's our society. Saying your suicide makes sense. That's not compassion, that's a deadly form of ableism.
Speaker 3:
And when we can bring that ableism to the surface, the bad news is that our current laws in Canada are so ableist and discriminate against people with disabilities. The good news is that when people realize this, when we bring it out to the surface in our experience, the average person so many Canadians they're not actually comfortable with it once they think it through. The problem is they haven't really thought that through. They already hold like we shouldn't discriminate against people with disabilities so that they can see hold on a second. Assisted suicide is discriminating against people with disabilities, denying them suicide prevention, denying them other resources.
Speaker 3:
I was reading an article just yesterday from psychiatrist Dr. John Maher and he was saying that in Canada right now assisted suicide is a right. But mental health, support, housing, these are not rights. Suicide prevention is not a right. So when we can show people the lack of privilege, the discrimination that people are facing with disabilities, the good news is that people are not comfortable with that. Even if they don't share a broader worldview, even if they might not, say, hold a Catholic worldview, even if we might disagree on a lot of things, we agree that ableism is wrong and we can use reason to appeal to that to change what they think on euthanasia and assisted suicide.
Sheila Nonato:
March for Life is coming up. Are you going to be in Ottawa? Are you in Toronto?
Speaker 3:
I'll be in Ottawa, Toronto and St John's, Newfoundland. So I'm speaking in Ottawa at a workshop after the Youth Summit on the abortion issue and how we can end the killing. I'll be speaking in Newfoundland on the abortion issue as well. But I'm the chair of the Toronto March for Life organizing committee, so I'll be in Toronto helping to run things with the rally and then moderating a panel in the workshops. But yeah, the National March for Life in Ottawa, the provincial one in Ontario and Newfoundland for me. So it'll be a busy May.
Sheila Nonato:
Okay, so you're speaking only on abortion, not on May.
Speaker 3:
Yes, it's on abortion for all three of those events.
Sheila Nonato:
How did you get into this advocacy?
Speaker 3:
work those events. How did you get into this advocacy work? Well, when I was in high school, at De La Salle (College), in grade 10, I was assigned to the pro-life side of an abortion debate and I was pro-life by default. But it was when I actually had to do my research into the subject, learn about how abortions were performed. I learned that my mom faced five tough pregnancies herself and that changed my pro-life view from just a default stance to a personal conviction. And it was earlier than that, when I was 11 in Kingston on a family vacation, that we drove past what must have been the pro-life group Show the Truth. Showing abortion victim photography. That was the first time that I saw photos of abortion victims and that was key to understanding the truth about showing abortion victim photography. That was the first time that I saw photos of abortion victims and that was key to understanding the truth about what abortion is. Because whenever I heard the word, I thought about the victims and the photos that I saw.
Speaker 3:
So I was convicted when I hit university at the University of Toronto.
Speaker 3:
Because of that conviction, I joined the University of Toronto Students for Life and I became active there with U of T Students for Life, eventually on the board of Toronto Right to Life and then later on working as my day job with the Canadian Centre for Biological Reform. And it was through the advocacy against abortion that I became active in the pro-life movement and that I learned a lot more about euthanasia and assisted suicide as well. Active in the pro-life movement and that I learned a lot more about euthanasia and assisted suicide as well. I spent years learning from great speakers and thinkers on euthanasia and assisted suicide. But the question that animated me was okay, but why is it wrong? How can we explain why it's wrong? And taking our experience talking to abortion on the streets and using apologetics there to use the same methods to develop apologetics on assisted suicide. So it's conviction. When I was young, got active in university and through being active in the pro-life movement on abortion, I became active on euthanasia and assisted suicide.
Sheila Nonato:
Can you explain the sort of the intersection or connection between being a technologist, of the intersection or connection between being a technologist?
Speaker 3:
a musician and (pro-life work), is there a connection? Yeah well, there's a lot of connections all over the place for me. You know, I did computer science as my major in undergrad but I did a master's in theological studies. I did minors in English and philosophy, which are a little more closely connected to theology. But for the technologist side, for the programmer and web developer side of me, I've always tried to put technology in the service of truth. Before I was working for the Canadian Center for Biological Reform, I was a freelance web developer doing the CCBR website and for a lot of other pro-life organizations. And using my kind of technology consultant background in the service of the pro-life organizations and using my kind of technology consultant background in the service of the pro-life movement or some other Catholic organizations, I was helping out as a web developer and technologist.
Speaker 3:
When it comes to music, that is and always has been a passion of mine, I think that there is a special role that beauty has to play in bringing the truth to light.
Speaker 3:
Pope Benedict, when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, in his address on the feeling of things, on the contemplation of beauty, he says that beauty is the wound of the heart that opens up the mind. Hans Urs von Balthasar also wrote and thought a lot about beauty and the role of beauty and truth and goodness. So the way that I think about it, when I'm doing pro-life work, I'm focused on goodness and bringing the truth in a more direct way. When I'm songwriting, I'm focused on beauty and sharing the truth, trying to open the mind to the truth in that way and I'm trying to express what's on my heart but trying to align what's on my heart with the truth and trying to explore the truth and beauty from that perspective. So my music, life and my pro-life work they're quite different spheres and they're quite separate in some ways, but I think that's the connection in a way, that there are different ways of exploring the truth.
Sheila Nonato:
Wow, what kind of music do you do?
Speaker 3:
I am a violinist and I play with other songwriters, but for myself I write my own songs. And from the folk to alternative rock space.
Sheila Nonato:
Have you produced an album or something like that? Where can we hear it?
Speaker 3:
So I'm slowly working on that through my home studio. I have played on some other people's albums as a violinist for years and I've had the privilege to tour from Powell River out in B. C. on the West Coast to Halifax on the East Coast with some Toronto songwriters and my music always took a back burner and I've been focused on writing and working on audio production at home to record an album. I have some songs, a few songs, available on my website at blaiseca slash music. That's B-L-A-I-S-E dot C-A slash music. I have a few recordings up there but I'm hoping in the next few years that I'll be able to self-produce an album with a lot of the stuff that I've been writing recently part of my podcast is featuring stories of people overcoming adversity.
Sheila Nonato:
Do you have you, can you share a story of overcoming some kind of obstacle in your line of work or even any time in your life?
Speaker 3:
A few things come to mind with relation to pro-life work In terms of my inspiration. When I mentioned my Mom went through five difficult pregnancies and she was pregnant with me when she was in medical school, which was a challenge. She had two miscarriages after me and then when she was pregnant with my sister, I was very serious in the hospital for weeks. It wasn't clear if she or my sister would make it through. Thankfully they both did. And then when she was pregnant with my younger brother, because of her complicated medical history, abortion was a suggestion and it was just unthinkable to her. So she went and found an OBGYN who was willing to work with her on a high risk pregnancy and that was an inspiration for me. When I learned about her story, I never really realized that as a high school student until I was talking to her about it. So that's my mom overcoming challenges and obstacles that inspired me when it comes to our pro-life work in general.
Speaker 3:
, the media . Canada is the only democracy on the planet that has no restrictions on abortion whatsoever in the law and there are lots of barriers to the pro-life message at the suite level , that's inspired a lot of other groups across the country . The end the killing movement routes around those obstacles at the suite level by going straight to the people at the street level , the government . Well , we go right to the sidewalks , we bring the message straight to the people . That inspired me to get active in the pro-life movement with the organizations that I have seen .
Speaker 3:
And then I think at a personal level, doing pro-life work, the obstacles are individually reaching any person. It's inspiring to see how many people will change their minds when you bring effective apologetics. When you're talking about an issue like abortion in particular, it's a very loaded issue and a lot of people have personal experience with abortion, so there's a real wounded culture there. Most of the time we have peaceful civil conversations, but when we're talking to thousands of people, there's a small minority of pro-choicers, often with wounds and personal experience with abortion, who will lash out with violence. So we have to be prepared for that, and I've been assaulted on the streets and we have to respond to that with grace and with mercy and justice, seeking justice in the courts and trying to always staying calm and de-escalating situations, responding with love. But we have to be prepared for violence at times. Unfortunately, even more commonly, we're not dealing with violence. You still have a lot of hostility, a lot of hardened hearts.
Speaker 3:
One of the terms that I coined in pro-life apologetics I guess it was about 12 years ago now was "heart apologetics, apologetics of the heart.
Speaker 3:
CCBR (Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform) as an organization, as a movement, has developed that a lot further.
Speaker 3:
We talk about apologetics in terms of the science and human rights and reason, but there's also the kind of like moral, psychology level the heart speaks on the heart, augustinian level, where we will train and put into practice how we need to listen, seeking to understand, like, what is this person trying to say that they're not putting into words, instead of hearing a callous pro-choice thing and thinking what's wrong with this person, changing our perspective to, in the face of that challenge, to reach that person, to ask, okay, what's happened to this person?
Speaker 3:
What's this person trying to tell me that they aren't putting into words and practicing empathy and love, and inspiring other people to overcome their difficult circumstances, to see an issue like abortion or assisted suicide in a different way. So I think that personal challenge on a day-to-day basis is how do I reach the person in front of me? And it's got to be about that individual person every time. Like there's general apologetics, but you have to. There's no one size fits all solution, in the sense that you've got to be a human being to the human being in front of you. You've got to respond to the whole person. So that's the kind of everyday obstacle and challenge is how can I reach this person? Across this big moral divide we have an opposite view on this contentious issue and how can I reach the whole person, head and heart, in order to change what they think and to minister to their wounds in conversation, through pro-life outreach?
Sheila Nonato:
I'm just curious to know more about your mom. Can you talk a little bit more about her?
Speaker 3:
My mom. She's inspired me in many ways. I didn't realize until talking to her about the abortion issue in high school how she had faced difficult pregnancies. Like it didn't click with me, like I knew she was pregnant with me in medical school. It didn't click till we had that explicit conversation, like, that would have been tough right To be pregnant for the first time while going through medical school.
Speaker 3:
I think one of the things that's inspired me about her to give me links to an earlier question you asked me about technology and music and pro-life work is the way in which she has integrated family and her passions and her work together in her life. She's a sports medicine physician and she's had the opportunity to work with national teams in Canada and she was always passionate about sport as a young person and she's had a chance to meet some of her heroes and work with some of her heroes in dance, in sport, as a sports medicine physician, and to integrate her work and her clinical practice with a passion of hers and to integrate that with family as well. In terms of a lot of our family vacations growing up were linked to travel that she was doing for work with sports teams and things like that and really neat experiences to be able to be backstage at some of these events and just to see the way in which she found ways to integrate her passions with her work. Yet family was still always her number one priority and sacrificing so much for me and my siblings to support us growing up. I don't know.
Speaker 3:
It's hard to imagine how she's done all of that to make it all work together. But you know, seeing family as her number one priority but finding ways to integrate her passions and interests into her work and her life were inspiration for me to take things that I'm interested in, like music and technology, and to integrate them into the work and my sort of mission and ministry and to never forget my family and to make space and priority of that as the number one priority all along in integrating all those things together too. I think that's the key thing that comes to mind. That inspires me about my mom.
Sheila Nonato:
What is her first name?
Speaker 3:
Julia.
Sheila Nonato:
Amazing and I hope you don't mind my asking because my kids are going to ask the hair. Are you able to talk about that?
Speaker 3:
I just think it's fun and maybe it's more the music side of me and being on the Toronto music scene and a little bit of the rock and roll, having a blue mohawk here. It does make for some interesting conversations in the pro-life space. If I saw me I would probably assume I was pro-choice, just statistically speaking. But it makes for some interesting common ground in the street sometimes or interesting conversations with pro-lifers too. I was giving an assisted suicide talk in Ontario a few weeks back and afterwards a man came up to me and he said you know, that was a really, really great talk. You really touched my heart. Thank you for that presentation.
Speaker 3:
Honestly, I wasn't expecting that and he sort of said that a few times and I was like hey, it's my pleasure to be here. I'm glad that the talk resonated with you. Why weren't you expecting it? Because of the blue mock. He's like yeah, yeah, like no offense or anything, but like I wasn't expecting that at first and I find that kind of fun too. But I just find it fun with the hair awesome. I've gone back and forth. Last year I was purple, it was solid purple for part of the year, so I would joke that was sort of the Lenten and Advent Mohawk for last year, and then I went back to this sort of turquoise that fades to a green for ordinary time.
Sheila Nonato:
I feel like you do need a bit of levity in approaching this kind of topic and sometimes, when it's a very heated kind of debate right, we tend to. I mean, we're all human we tend to sort of see the humanity of the other side. We get entrenched in our own beliefs and then we don't see. Maybe there's something. Maybe we might want to listen and see. What is it? Like you were saying, what is the common ground? Are we actually on the same side in the grand scheme of things?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, yeah, is that sort of yeah.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, or is there some kind of connection there? I was at Fanshawe College a few weeks back in London, ontario, and I was with the London Against Abortion team doing pro-life outreach. I was standing a bit back from the team because I was the team leader and I was on security camera, like I was just watching and making sure everyone was okay in conversation, kind of observing from a distance. And a student approached me assuming that I was pro-choice, and she later said it was because of my hair. And she said something about like oh you know, can you believe these people? And I was like well, actually I'm part of the group there and it was the start of what ended up being a 40, 45-minute conversation and she was very strongly pro-choice and thought the worst of pro-lifers and I was able to challenge her on some of her pro-choice beliefs. She didn't change her mind in the conversation but I used some of the pro-life apologetics and challenge some of the ways that that that she was thinking I think gave her something to think about. But I think even more so in that conversation we just built a lot of rapport and we realized there was actually a lot of areas in which we agreed, even though there were areas in which we disagreed, and I think for her, for someone who is that strongly pro-choice, that's a key step, a key prerequisite, right Like she's not going to just change her view to pro-life if she thinks that pro-life people are terrible and awful and don't care about other human beings.
Speaker 3:
But when we had a chance to have a real long conversation and she's like okay, you know what? Actually it seems like these pro-life groups that I thought were terrible are motivated by love. They have a concern for other people. We actually share this concern, but we disagree on this question of science or on this question of what you should do in a difficult circumstance Like that. Human connection is a key step to someone changing their mind. It's not why I have a blue mohawk, but sometimes I guess, when we're doing pro-life outreach as a team, everybody in the team is different and has different personalities and might be in a position to talk to other people, like one person on the team might be able to make a connection with somebody. Somebody else might be able to might be able to make a connection with somebody else. So on that day in Fanshawe in February, it was the blue Mohawk that opened up a conversation that otherwise wouldn't have happened with that student, and I think it was a very meaningful conversation.
Sheila Nonato:
That's awesome. You know, maybe I should have dyed my hair too. I was taking a women's human rights class.
Sheila Nonato:
It was the first day, I think and we were paired up and I think, yeah, like you were saying assumptions about people, the person, it had nothing to do with abortion. To be honest, this assignment. The first thing she said to me was not hi, hello, what's your name? She said I hate people who are anti-abortion and I think I hate what. I don't even know what to say. To be honest, this is about women's human rights and I am for women. So how do you, if you encounter somebody who is hostile and might be carrying some baggage, what's the best way to respond? I didn't say anything. I wasn't sure what to say.
Speaker 3:
How would you respond? So that's where the hard apologetics comes in, and I could give a whole hour presentation on that, but in just a couple of minutes. The three steps we teach in Heart Apologetics is first, listen, seeking to understand. Second, communicate the truth in love. And third is about inspiring people to see suffering and difficult circumstances in a different way. So how I would start with someone who's that hostile is with that first step, that listen, seeking to understand.
Speaker 3:
So I wouldn't be concerned right away about trying to share a pro-life argument. I want to make connection, find common ground, take the time to listen. So I probably start by asking the question like oh, why is that? Like why do you hate people who are any abortion Right? And just ask and try and listen and see where she's coming from. You know questions you might ask. Like you seem really passionate about that, so it sounds like a really strong belief. Like, have you always hated people who are anti-abortion? Or when did you come to hate people who are anti-abortion?
Speaker 3:
Right, questions that show a genuine interest in where she's coming from. And who knows what might come out of that. Right, like maybe there was someone who was pro-life, who was really mean and nasty to her and now she's projecting that on everybody else. Or maybe she has some really strong misconceptions about what pro-lifers believe and she's just jumping to assumptions based on stereotypes that are untrue. Or maybe she's really worried about a particular situation in which she thought abortion would be medically necessary and actually it isn't.
Speaker 3:
But her understanding is that it was you know. So taking the time to try and show a genuine interest in where she's coming from, trying to understand her, I think is the key to having, first of all, making that human connection, showing that you care. There's a friend of mine in New Brunswick who, when I was doing a heart apologetics talk, he put it this way. He said people won't care what you know until they know that you care. Right, so taking that time to show that you care and to take a genuine interest in understanding the person in front of you, build that human connection and then, and only then, I think, can you have an avenue to communicate the pro-life message in a way that might actually reach them. First, you have to understand where they're coming from and they have to know that you care.
Sheila Nonato:
Finally, there's a Hamilton by-law. I think they're discussing it. I don't know if you've heard about the ban on images of fetus on flyers. What do you think about this proposed ban?
Speaker 3:
So there's the proposed ban in Hamilton is on images of fetuses, of fetal imagery, ultrasound photos, or abortion victim photography on flyers delivered to homes or on signs in the street is the question now. Toronto had a very similar motion. And just a couple of weeks ago, the City of Toronto came back with a report basically saying we don't, they said they don't recommend any bylaws right now because there are serious charter issues and how do you define this? And they've said we shouldn't do this. There's freedom of expression here, and what's disturbing to one person might not be disturbing to another. And how do you do this in a fair and legal way? But the city of London, in Ontario, has already gone ahead and put bylaws like this in place. Burlington has by-laws in place for fetal imagery on flyers. So right now there are several cities around Ontario, some in Alberta, who have already passed bylaws that I think are unconstitutional and violate the Charter Right to Freedom of Expression, and there are other cities like Toronto, London, Hamilton and the region of Niagara who are currently looking at the question of whether they whether or not they should pass bylaws.
Speaker 3:
I'm leading a campaign against this. (It's) a c oalition of pro-life groups. You can find out more information at defendourvoice. ca and there's information on what's going on and what you can do about it, because we need pro-lifers regardless of where you live. We need pro-lifers inside the city of Hamilton, outside the city of Hamilton, to sign the petition for the city of Hamilton, to email Hamilton City Council and then, if you do live in Hamilton, there are steps you can take and a guide on the website for how you can talk to your city councillor about the issue and similarly, even if you live in Hamilton to be emailing and signing petitions for London or Niagara or Toronto as well. So defendourvoice. ca, because if we don't defend our voice, then we can't continue to be a voice for voiceless pre-born children. So it's really important that pro-lifers speak up to defend pro-life freedom of expression, with what's going on in several cities in Canada right now.
Sheila Nonato:
Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 3:
Thanks so much for having me.
Sheila Nonato:
Take care, thank you. Thank you to Blaise Alleyne for speaking with me about the concept he created called Heart Apologetics, a way to open the lines of communication about pro-life issues with people who may not share the same opinion or faith as you. The bottom line is that everything goes back to love and respect. We may not agree on every issue, but we always respect one another's human dignity and freedom of speech and thought. At Veil and Armor, we will explore topics that may be unpopular or go against the current. We hope to keep those lines of communication open so we can find common ground. In the next episode, we will be joined by speaking coach and story consultant, emanuela Hall, about how to speak with clarity and lasting impact. Thank you for joining us. Have a great week, god bless.
Blaise Alleyne:
Thank you for listening to the Veil and Armor podcast. I invite you to share this with another Catholic mom today. Please subscribe to our podcast and YouTube channel and please spread the word. Let's be brave, let's be brave, let's be bold and be blessed together.