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Pro-Life Stars Shine At Awards Night

An assistant to President Reagan. A TV ad producer. Two mothers, each with five children, who have labored tirelessly in the pro-life movement. Two brothers, both faithful foot soldiers in the pro-life army.

All these people have one thing in common:  they all received awards and recognition for their pro-life work at the Third Annual Pro-Life Appreciation Night on September 23.

At the event, sponsored by the law firm of Peroutka & Peroutka, four hundred pro-lifers crowded into Michael’s Eighth Avenue in Glen Burnie to honor the recipients.

Pro-life pioneer, author and lecturer Dr. Jack Willke and his wife Barbara were on hand to present the Dr. Jack and Barbara Willke Founders Award to Anne Higgins and her late husband George.

Anne regaled the audience with anecdotes from her years as assistant to President Reagan in charge of correspondence.

She recalled a Knights of Malta pro-life dinner at which Reagan was being honored, where a befuddled speaker confused the word “fetus” with “feces.”

“You all were once feces,” he told the shocked diners, singling out many of them by name, including Cardinal John O’Connor, as former “feces.”

“How did you like the dinner?” Anne asked the President on their drive home.

“It was great until the feces hit the fan,” quipped Reagan.

Anne edited the President’s book, Abortion and the Conscience of a Nation, sent him a constant stream of pro-life letters and materials, and filled her department with young pro-lifers.

Working for the pro-life President “was the highlight of my life,” she said.

The Senator Francis X. Kelly Political Action Award went to Chris Trivane, head of Terra Productions recording studio in Edgewater, who voluntarily produced pro-life television ads for the 2002 election in Maryland, as well as TV ads for local pregnancy centers and videos for the Gabriel Project.

Remarking on Chris’s recovery from a near-fatal heart attack last summer, emcee Steve Peroutka speculated, “Apparently there is still more that God expects of him!”

Cookie Harris was presented with the Dr. William J. Hogan Education Award by Dr. Hogan himself, chiefly for her work, as Defend Life’s Lecture Director, in arranging engagements for many pro-life speakers at churches, high schools and colleges.

Cookie also heads the pro-life group at her parish, St. Joseph’s in Cockeysville, started the bi-weekly prayer vigil at Baltimore’s Seneca abortion mill, and is a counselor at Pregnancy Center North in Towson.

Cathy Roth received the James A. Miller-Robert G. Haase Hero Award for opening her heart and her home to women in crisis pregnancies, pro-lifers traveling through the area, and pro-life priests and not-so-pro-life priests.

She founded and led the very active Youth for Life group, prayed and sidewalk counseled at abortion mills in Maryland and D.C., and was pro-life coordinator at St. Paul’s Catholic Church in Damascus.

Brothers John and Syd Marcus received the Marilyn Szewczyk Service Award for what Steve Peroutka termed many years of steadfast service as “foot soldiers for life.”

In addition to his pro-life work with his Knights of Columbus Council, John prayed and offered help to women outside the Hillcrest Southeast abortuary in Washington, D.C., for over 15 years, until it closed last spring.

Syd, a long-time and active member of Maryland Right to Life, helped organize the Charles County Right to Life chapter, has worked on both the Annapolis and the national Marches for Life, and has testified in Annapolis for pro-life legislation.

Dr. Willke followed the awards presentations with an incisive review of the medical facts regarding stem cell research, cloning and emergency contraception.

Contrasting the demonstrated advantages of adult stem cells over embryonic stem cells in curing diseases, Willke observed, “Private venture capital is funding many adult stem cell projects, but no embryonic stem cell research.”

A stickler for the importance of truthful wording, the doctor decried the term “therapeutic” cloning, which refers to human clones created for research and killed after two to three weeks.

“A better term is ‘clone-and-kill,’” he said.

Michael Peroutka, who is the Constitution Party’s candidate for President, reminded the audience that the Constitution Party “is 100 percent pro-life, no exceptions, for all nine months.

“We’re on the ballot in 40 states, including Maryland.  You don’t have to vote for the lesser of two evils; you do have a Constitutional choice,” he said.

Michael ended the ceremonies by presenting his brother Steve with the Champion of the Innocents Award.

He called Steve, who hosts the pro-life “Face the Truth” show on radio stations WNAV and WAVA, “a selfless and tireless warrior for the innocents.”