Pro-Life Training Program Series
Communication is key to success

By Janet Baker
Treasurer, Pro-Life Maryland, Inc.

In this installment, we will be taking a "side trip." This digression is occasioned by the article in the Sept.-Oct. Defend Life, "Pastor 'disinvites' pro-aborts after e-mail and fax protest."

As the article makes clear, we could not have accomplished that task without the use of electronic technology, most notably e-mail.

Through e-mail, I was able to alert those on my list about two hours after I learned of this planned debacle at St. Mary's. Forest Grauel, also via e-mail, supplied us all with valuable contact information, plus a flyer for distribution at a demonstration at St. Mary's.

Armed with the information that Forest and I supplied, many good people started generating faxes, e-mails and phone calls of their own‹both to St. Mary's pastor to protest the event and to their own contacts to alert them to act.

No doubt the phone lines at St. Mary's were soon in "meltdown" mode. Two of my friends, the Manleys, got through to the chancery, who promised to address the problem.

That afternoon St. Mary's pastor announced the cancellation of the undesirable appearances. All this occurred within the space of two days, thanks be to God and the tools that He places at our disposal.

Efficient communication was the key here (along with a "team" spirit). The article stated that perhaps this was the first pro-life action initiated by e-mail. I'm not surprised by that, but I'm concerned at that. Our Lord has given us resources to use, and He expects us to make use of them.

Regrettably, too many of us still don't take the need to communicate seriously, and I'm not speaking of only the usage of e-mail. It's not uncommon for me to place phone calls to other pro-lfers regarding pro-life matters, only to receive no response.

Certainly we are all busy, but such unresponsiveness, particularly if it's chronic, shows lack of common courtesy, let alone Christian charity. This sort of minor neglect, if it regularly occurs, will lead not only to poor coordination of effort amongst pro-lifers, but also to misunderstanding, distrust and resentment amongst us.

I'm not saying this merely to blow off steam; if it happens to me, I'm all too certain that it's widespread.

Moreover, lack of timely responsiveness will render useless many efforts; for instance, what use would it be to be e-mailed about a piece of legislation going for a vote if one, who downloads only once a week, sees the alert after the vote has already occurred?

In my sidewalk counseling efforts throughout the years, I have become aware of what I'll call a "lone wolf" mentality that exists with some of us, which often manifests itself in the communication problems described above.

While we may salute one another from afar and even chat with them at the mills, for some, there's not much practical realization that we are all members of the same team and thus may benefit by acting as such.

For instance, counselors and pray-ers at an abortion mill that's well-covered often will not consider relocating to another abortion mill that is poorly covered.

In fact, I find that many pro-lifers will be very diligent about attending to what they consider their "niche" in the pro-life movement, but they lose sight of serving the bigger picture of establishing the Culture of Life.

Clearly, a key to overcoming this narrowness of vision is regular, systematic and disciplined communication with one another. Each pro-lifer must resolve that he/she will do what it takes to communicate with others and learn to work as a larger team.

Not only will we get much done, but I think we'll find that we'll make some real friends from all this.

Brian Clowes identifies four indispensable foundation stones to the pro-life effort: training, recruitment, information and prayer. He uses the acronym TRIP for easy recall.

I propose two additional foundation stones: communication and solidarity. An acronym for the six foundations could be SCRIPT.