Tips for Productive Dialogue

We know there's the Scott Klusendorf event in Iowa City on March 25 & 26.  But this video includes some basic tips on making your dialogue with other people more productive.  Much of it is useful regardless of the topic, but it's particularly useful for talking about the pro-life topic.  So many people recognize that the angry rhetoric we all heard last year is not productive.  Wouldn't you like to learn a few tips to avoid last year's arguments?  Check this out!

http://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/video-dialogue-tips-speech-mock-dialogue-students-for-life-conference/

Pro-Life Training by Scott Klusendorf

Don't miss the best pro-life training available in Eastern Iowa this year!

Saturday, March 25, 2017
St. Patrick Church- Iowa City  9:00 am - 3:30 pm
Full day of training- includes Lunch
Freewill offering  (Registration Requested by Mar. 23)

Sunday, March 26, 2017
St. Wenceslaus Church  1:00 - 2:30 pm  
The presentation will include a brief introduction to pro-life apologetics. 
Freewill offering  (Registration Requested by Mar. 23)

Scott Klusendorf trains pro-life advocates to persuasively defend their views in the public square. Scott travels throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe training groups of people to engage in conversation about abortion. He contends that the pro-life message CAN compete in the marketplace of ideas if properly understood and properly articulated. Klusendorf is President of Life Training Institute and is the author of The Case for Life: Equipping Christians to Engage the Culture. www.prolifetraining.com 

Register on the page at the link below by Thursday, March 23.

http://www.jcrtl.org/scott-klusendorf---pro-life-training.html

You may contact Sheryl Schwager for more information (319) 855-8475
Presentations sponsored by Johnson County Right to Life & Iowa Right to Life


Our extra note about this:
We've shared books and shown videos to help our members make solid arguments in defense of life. Scott led people to argue more persuasively on this subject.  The books, videos, and websites we've pointed people to in the past have been put together by people who were inspired or greatly influenced by Scott.  So if you want to get some great training, don't miss this event!

Why Focus on Life Issues?

When people wonder why pro-lifers seem so focused on the life issue, seemingly ignoring other issues, I think of the way I described it to a like-minded pro-lifer this past weekend.

Imagine seeing someone being threatened at gun-point, and also seeing two people who appear hungry and homeless who are at half the distance as the person with the gun.  I would hope people would try to do what is needed to prevent someone from being killed, and then go back to help the others.

Pro-lifers are the type of people who take action to protect the person whose life is directly threatened.  Some people might take direct action, while others might simply call the police.  But we take action one way or another.  We recognize the urgency and the need to stop people who have the intention of ending human lives.  But after addressing the most pressing needs, we can go back and help others with less pressing, but still important needs.  We also note the magnitude of abortion, which takes more lives each year than anything else in our nation.  Like any subset of society, we all have a variety of interests and concerns.  So we don't just care about one thing, and yet the other things we care about vary greatly.

If we wanted to attack the character of people accusing us of being so focused on this worthy cause, we could easily cause the conversation to erupt.  All we would have to do is escalate things by saying something about how they must not care if people die.  We know it does no good to attack the character of others, nor is it respectful.  Let's stick to the issue at hand and have more productive dialogue.

It's not all about the numbers, but numbers are staggering

Who would ever think society would slip so far as to require decades of arguing to convince people that killing innocent children is not a good thing?  Who would ever imagine people could spend their lives working jobs to counter the messages of an industry that's built upon spreading the culture of death?  We admire the people who make such a commitment.  We need to prioritize the pro-life issues, especially abortion.  As time passes, we have more threats to the dignity of human life.  Mother Teresa was right about the way a culture that accepts abortion will soon fail to protect life at other stages.

Parking Reminder

Many people who come to pray during 40 Days for Life are used to parking on 35th St. Dr. SE next to Planned Parenthood.  As we pointed out at the turn of the year, lane markings were added to the street, which resulted in NO PARKING next to Planned Parenthood.  If you park there, you will block traffic.  The photo attached to this blog post shows a vehicle parked illegally.  Do NOT park where the Planned Parenthood employee parked!  You may park on the other side of the street.  But leave room for the family that lives across the street.  You may also park on 34th or Elm.

Do Not Park Here