Will you join me in this work?

I'm writing to invite you into something I believe genuinely matters, and to ask for your support this summer, financially and in prayer. I want to tell you why.

This July, I'll be joining the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform (CCBR) as an intern for eight weeks, from July 6 to August 29, doing outreach across the Greater Toronto Area. That means showing up on campuses, at doorsteps, and in public spaces to have real conversations with Canadians about abortion. To make this possible, I need to raise $5,000 before July 6. You're one of the people I thought of, and I hope you'll prayerfully consider coming alongside me.

Canada is the only democracy in the world with no abortion laws. Around 300 pre-born children are killed every day. That is not a statistic to scroll past. It is a reality that demands a response.

The pro-life movement works across three areas: caring for women in crisis through pregnancy centres, advocating for legal protections for the unborn, and changing hearts and minds through education. CCBR focuses on that third area, and they believe, rightly I think, that without it the other two cannot make much progress. Laws follow public opinion. And public opinion changes through conversation.

CCBR's strategy is two-fold: making the reality of abortion visible, and equipping people to have honest, compassionate conversations with ordinary Canadians about it. Think less protest, more conversation. Their staff and interns go out every day to campuses, neighbourhoods, and public spaces to engage people where they are, listen carefully, and speak truthfully. Of around 4,400 conversations tracked in 2023 alone, one in five people became fully pro-life, and one in seven became more pro-life. These are not small numbers. These are changed minds and, in many cases, saved lives.

And it is showing up nationally. Opposition to abortion has roughly doubled since CCBR launched this work in 2012. What strikes me most is that young Canadians, aged 18 to 34, are now less supportive of abortion than older generations. Something is genuinely changing, one conversation at a time.

Over the last few years, I've had the privilege of being involved in mission and outreach here in Toronto, meeting people experiencing homelessness, working alongside those living in poverty, and trying to understand the deeper issues that keep people stuck and unseen. That work has shaped me in ways I didn't expect. It has taught me that the people our world most easily overlooks are often the ones who need someone to show up for them the most. And it has given me a conviction I can't shake: that the church has a responsibility to speak up for those who have no voice, not just the ones we can see, but also the ones we can't.

That is what draws me to this work.

We live in a world that increasingly measures human worth by usefulness. By convenience. By whether your existence makes someone else's life easier or harder. And when a pregnancy is unplanned, or difficult, or costly, our culture's quiet answer is often: this life is a problem to be solved. But that child is not a problem. That child has a mother and a father. That child belongs to a family, a story, a community. That child, if given the chance, will have a name, a laugh, a personality all their own, and people who cannot imagine the world without them. They are as real and as precious as anyone you and I have ever loved. And they deserve someone to show up for them.

I think about the people I've met through outreach here in Toronto, people who were told, in one way or another, that they were too much, too difficult, too costly to love. And I think about what it meant to them when someone simply showed up and said: you matter, you belong, you are not alone. That is exactly what this work is saying to the unborn. You are not an inconvenience. You are not a burden. You have a mother and a father. You have a story that has already begun. And your life is worth fighting for.

Being pro-life, at its heart, is not a political position. It is a deeply human one, rooted in the belief that every person is known and loved by the God who made them. I've come to believe that standing for the unborn belongs in the same breath as caring for the poor, welcoming the stranger, and fighting for justice. These are not separate causes. They are all expressions of the same stubborn, beautiful conviction that every single human life has dignity and deserves to be protected.

I'll be honest with you. I don't come to this with years of pro-life outreach behind me. But I do come with a genuine passion for the vulnerable, a willingness to have hard conversations, and a deep desire to do this with both courage and kindness. And I believe that is exactly what this moment calls for.

I'm going into this summer to learn as much as to serve. I want to grow in how to talk about hard things without losing warmth, and how to listen in a way that genuinely opens people up. And I want to bring those things back to the communities I'm part of here in Toronto, at Grace Toronto, New Life, and others, and help the people around me engage their neighbours with the same honesty and care.

If giving isn't possible right now, I'd genuinely value your prayers. Please pray for the people we'll meet this summer who are carrying this issue more personally than we'll know, and for the courage to stay present with them well.