The following is the text of our speech given at the rally at Queen’s Park before the 2025 Toronto March for Life.
“If I could go back in time, I would change it.”
This is the text I recently received from a woman I met in 2022, and today I want to share her story with you. To protect her privacy, I’ll call her Jenny.
I met Jenny while doing an internship with the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform, an organization that, as many of you may know, focuses on doing street outreach and changing people’s minds on abortion through conversation. One day, we were doing this outreach in a suburban neighborhood in Toronto when Jenny walked by. When I asked her what she thought about abortion she got really quiet. After I prompted her some more she shared with me that she had had an abortion only two years prior. She clearly regretted her decision as she struggled to tell me about it. When I asked if she had support around her she said no. I tried my best to talk to her and ask questions to help, but soon she had to go and catch her bus. I quickly gave her a pamphlet which had a post-abortive healing website on it, and on a whim I also gave her my email. Thankfully, I was able to get in touch with her over email quite soon, and quickly sent her more resources. I heard back from her off and on, but she didn’t share much, and after a while we lost touch.
Then, a year later, on a random summer day, I received an email from her. It read:
Hello Naomi, this is (Jenny), we met last year. I reached out to thank you. God bless you for comforting me. Sorry for not responding to the last email – I wasn’t ignoring it but talking about it was triggering at that time. Now I accepted that I can’t change it and also cleansed myself in front of God. I would like to thank you again for all the support you gave to me.
Since then, Jenny and I have been able to stay in touch more often. After texting her a couple of weeks ago to ask how she was doing, she shared more of her story. She said when she found out she was pregnant it was extremely unexpected and she panicked, worried that it may have been an ectopic pregnancy due to her situation. Without even double checking, she made the decision to abort her child within those first 3 days. No one talked to her about what she was doing, and before she knew it, her child was gone. Jenny shared with me that the baby on the flyer I had given her that day in Toronto was the same age as her baby when she got the abortion – 8 weeks.
By God’s grace, Jenny was able to work through the horrific experience of abortion that she went through and find healing. I never expected to hear from her that summer day. In fact, I never expected to hear from her again after our initial conversation.
The reason I share this story is because there are so many Jenny’s out there. Women who, like Jenny, were in a difficult situation, made a quick decision, and now live with guilt and regret everyday because of the choices that they made.
When abortion is available, it’s seen as an easy, quick escape from a difficult situation. When it’s become so normalized in a country without any laws against it for almost 40 years, it’s no wonder women are turning to it so easily. And when women are told their whole lives that abortion is an option, they may even reach a point where it doesn’t even feel like a decision worth regretting.
How can we change things? How can we stop women like Jenny from making a decision they will regret? How can we show women that there are other, life-giving, life-affirming options?
Well, we need to have conversations like the one I had with Jenny, where we ask hard questions and wait patiently for answers. We need resources for pregnant women, and for post-abortive women. And, we need a law.
Right now in Canada, we have no law restricting abortion. Canada is the only democratic country in the world with zero protections for pre-born children. A baby can be aborted at 8 weeks, 18 weeks, or 38 weeks – for any reason.
The We Need a Law campaign seeks to change this. We Need a Law is a campaign focused on bringing the pro-life conversation to Canada’s federal and provincial leaders and providing action tools for pro-life Canadians like you. We’re calling for something very basic: legal recognition of pre-born children. Not just as a moral idea, not just as a personal belief, but as a matter of law.
We need a law protecting children from abortion because human rights start when human life begins — and science is crystal clear: that’s at conception. Every abortion ends the life of a unique, irreplaceable human being.
Canadians deserve better than abortion. Over 80% of Canadians believe there should be at least some limits on abortion — especially in the third trimester. And yet, no level of government has passed a law since the Supreme Court struck down the old law in 1988.
We can’t let this issue be ignored. Abortion must be part of our political debates, elections, and legal conversations. Too many Canadians don’t even realize there’s no law against abortion in this country—and that needs to change.
Abortion takes the lives of 1 in 5 children in Canada. That means, in a crowd like this, for every four people here, there’s another one who’s missing.
No matter what, we must continue to speak up. Because getting to the day when all pre-born children are protected takes multiple steps. These steps must be directed towards limiting the harm of abortion and safeguarding pre-born lives. Since the launch of the We Need a Law campaign in 2012, we have employed an incremental strategy, working in steps, which has opened up excellent opportunities to find common ground with many Canadians who share pro-life values. We have worked with MPs on introducing pro-life bills, such as the sex-selective abortion act and pre-born victims of crime bills. Every time a bill is introduced, it brings about amazing opportunities for discussion, awareness, and relationship building with Canadians across the country with whom we can find common ground.
Our grassroots supporters across the country have been bringing this issue up too, month after month, year after year, refusing to be silenced, refusing to let the pre-born child be ignored. Flag displays, yard signs, postcard writing, and letters to the editor have been happening all year round. This past year, We Need a Law also organized an initiative called Hats of Hope. We asked our supporters to knit, crochet, or sew a baby hat and then send it to a Member of Parliament in memory of a child lost to abortion. We encouraged you to include a message with the hat letting your MP know how deeply you care about the issue of abortion and calling on them to protect pre-born children, and then asking them to donate the hat to a hospital or pregnancy care centre in their area.
We need to continually connect the word abortion with the loss of real human life. Handmade hats were a beautiful way to do this while also blessing a baby who is allowed to be born.
My friend Jenny was never able to put a little hat on her baby. But a hat to represent her baby that was lost was sent to a Member of Parliament. And they were reminded that this issue is still relevant. The case is not closed.
As we gather here today, let’s never forget to continue fighting for a law. For a law to protect women like Jenny from making choices that they will regret. For a law to protect pre-born babies from certain death.
Every small act of faithfulness counts. Let’s ensure our leaders continually hear from us – let’s fill their desks with baby hats, with letters asking them to take action, let’s fill their inboxes with emails, and make this an issue that’s impossible for them to ignore.
Do not think that you are not needed in the pro-life movement, or that pro-life action is a one-day event. We need you here today, encouraging each other, and we need you out there every day, bringing the message of life to everyone around you – whether that’s through conversations, through public displays, through emails and meetings with your neighbours and elected representatives – we need you.
You have already shown that you can fight by being here today. So, I encourage you as you go from here, to stay involved. To speak up for the most vulnerable in our country. Let’s ensure we speak up for the Jenny’s of the world, and their children, and fight for a law protecting pre-born children.