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Defend Life speaker inspires College Park coed

Cathy McLeod was manning a Genocide Awareness Project display at University of Maryland College Park last November when she was confronted by a female student.

The young woman, clearly horrified by the large, graphic posters of aborted babies, cried out angrily, “How can you say that abortion is wrong for someone who was raped, was addicted to drugs, and had no financial resources?’

“I knew I had to go slow in talking to her,” said McLeod.  “I explained that the means of conception does not change the value of the child; we need to give the woman care and compassion, but not tell her the answer is to abort the child.

“Her eyes lit up with tears and she ran away.”

Cathy jumped the rope marking off the GAP display and, catching up to the distraught student, “I gave her the biggest hug I ever gave anyone.  I said, ‘You deserved better than that.’”

The girl told Cathy she had had a second trimester abortion.  She knew it was a girl and had even bought clothes for her, but her boyfriend had pressured her to have the abortion.

“I gave her my e-mail address, and I said, ‘I’m going to pray for you every day,’ and I encouraged her to seek counseling,” Cathy recalled.

McLeod recounted this incident in a January 16 talk at Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in Kensington to illustrate her conviction that, while being able to win the abortion debate through logic and argument is very important, “I think compassion is what is going to win for us; the bottom line is compassion and love.”

A junior from South Jersey, Cathy said she has always been pro-life, but she and other pro-life students really became active when Defend Life-sponsored speaker Stephanie Gray gave a talk at College Park in April 2003.

Stephanie, who is director of the Center for Bioethical Reform in Canada, presented the scientific and philosophical arguments against abortion before an audience of 75 enthusiastic students.

“I realized how sound her arguments were,” said Cathy.  “I hold her solely responsible for lighting the University of Maryland on fire on this issue – we knew we couldn’t be quiet any more.

“We didn’t even have a pro-life group then, but we started one right after that.”

Cathy had been a theater major, but was so impressed by Stephanie’s talk that the next day she changed her major to philosophy with an emphasis on ethics.

The newly formed Maryland Students for Life sprang into action, co-sponsoring a campus GAP exhibit in September 2003 with the Center for Bioethical Reform, with the financial and logistical help of Defend Life.

They signed up student members during the two-day event, and have been going strong ever since.

“We have over 100 people registered in Maryland Students for Life, with 30 active members,” said McLeod.

The group meets once a week, conducting “mini-lessons” on pro-life skills at each meeting.

Last October they erected a Cemetery of the Innocents display on Hornbake Mall, with 4,000 tiny pink and blue flags representing the number of babies killed by abortion each day in the U.S.

Some people hated these displays, said Cathy.  “But I had people who came up and said that GAP or the Cemetery really got through to them.”

The group also sponsors speakers, such as Feminists for Life President Serrin Foster, who talked about how abortion is exploitation of women.

“The feminist group at Maryland is our nemesis; they’re ‘pro-choice’ and they’re out to get us at every event with counter-demonstrations,” said Cathy.  “They’ve been quite pesty this year.”

Students for Life invited Feminists at Maryland to Foster’s talk, and they came, said McLeod.

“Serrin asked them if they would join her in a pregnancy resource effort to help the women students on campus who have children.  They just bailed!  It’s ironic – they say they’re for women.”

Since last October, the many Students for Life speakers and events have generated a “newspaper battle”– a running debate on abortion in the school newspaper, The Diamondback.

“One guy wrote that the feminists had no logical argument – they just resorted to name-calling and screaming,” said Cathy.

While Maryland Students for Life has been keeping the abortion issue front and center at College Park, Cathy has energetically promoted the pro-life cause off-campus as well.

She gave pro-life talks at all the Masses at Holy Redeemer Church the weekend of January 15-16.

And over winter break, the 20-year-old student, a practicing Catholic, went back to her Catholic high school and gave pro-life talks at nine religion classes.

Cathy has also spoken at Rowan University in South Jersey.      “They started a pro-life group there as a result, so it has been a chain reaction,” she said.