This Saturday, we took some of our new student leaders into chaos.
After an exhausting week here in Washington, our team headed to San Francisco to distribute 5,000 I am the Pro-Life Generation signs and meet hundreds of our student leaders at the 70,000-person Walk for Life.
After passing out our signs our team learned that a radical pro-abortion group calling pregnancy “enslavement” and publicly advocating for violence against pro-life sidewalk counselors was protesting the Walk.
So, we decided to take action — to stand up for our beliefs and make sure the liberal San Francisco media couldn’t just get pictures of them protesting, leaving 70,000 pro-lifers out of their story.
After a quick prayer, we and 25 of our new student leaders from Oregon, New Mexico, and California walked into their protest and peacefully held our 25-foot We are the Pro-Life Generation sign. While our sign was represented in all of the media shots, what we didn’t expect was the level of hatred these protesters have for us. It was like nothing we’ve ever seen before. In midst of the curse words, one girl immediately tried to jump on top of Kristan Hawkins and a man tried to hit her. Thankfully, she had spoken to the police before we arrived to guarantee our students’ safety. Because once we arrived, police officers had to form a human shield around us as we stood to represent the preborn and their mothers. (Were they even expecting what happened?)
In the mist of their insults and shouting at us, a girl tried to jump on Kristan Hawkins while she held a homemade sign that said “Fetus Slayer.” You see, this is common for us as those who are often the most hateful are those still hurting from their abortion and is why everything we do is peaceful and in love.
Soon after we arrived at the protest, the Walk for Life began and our team joined the pro-life crowd with a chorus of cheers that rang throughout the city blocks. Our students were relieved to be back in home territory.
However, that night our students began emailing us and posting on Facebook about their experience with us.
One girl told Kristan she had been scared to stand at a pro-life booth on her campus before this event but now wasn’t afraid of anything. Another student messaged me on Facebook saying, “I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say that this trip made the pro-life movement more tangible and exciting than its ever been for me before.”
What we asked these students to do took courage and now they are more committed than ever to stand for life. That’s the power of what we are able to do — form relationships with these students, lead the charge, and teach them how amazing it can be to witness for Life.
