News
Update: For the LOVE of Germany
Did you hear the one about the lawyer who traveled overseas and taught a bunch of U.S. military families how to better serve women facing unexpected pregnancies?
Fair enough, there’s not much promise for a joke in that question, but you have to admit, the latest Heartbeat International international training does sound a bit peculiar when you first hear about it.
The story took place October 25, when Ellen Foell, Heartbeat’s legal counsel, taught a day-long session of The LOVE Approach™ to a group of 28 staff, volunteers, and potential volunteers at Heartbeat Crisis Pregnancy Center in Ramstein, Germany.
The center, under the direction of Carrie Beliles, primarily serves U.S. military personnel and their families stationed at Ramstein Air Base, home of the 86th Airlift Wing and headquarters of U.S. Air Forces Europe.
“It was the first time teaching this material, so I really didn’t quite know what to expect,” Foell, who has been with Heartbeat International since 2012, said. “God really put two things on my heart that I tried to express to the group: The first was to encourage them to embrace their unique, God-given giftedness, and the second was to allow themselves to be released to really exercise that giftedness as they sought to serve women coming to the center.”
“It really was great to watch this group wrestle through how to apply The LOVE Approach to the real situations involving real human beings they are dealing with every day.”
While the majority of attendees were Americans connected to the military community in Ramstein, one participant came from another part of Germany with the hope to launch a pregnancy help organization in another part of Germany.
According to Heartbeat International’s Worldwide Directory, there are currently 114 pregnancy help organizations in Germany, although Heartbeat Crisis Pregnancy Center is the only Heartbeat International affiliate.
“These servants learned how to handle a great tool, and that was encouraging to see,” Foell said. “I was really impressed by the cross-section of ages and generations, and thrilled to see the seeds of more pregnancy help organizations being planted in Germany.”
Foell was joined by Heartbeat International Vice President Jor-El Godsey, who keynoted the center’s annual banquet and facilitated a meeting with European pro-life leaders during a three-day span Oct. 24-26 in Ramstein.
Marius and The Myth of Unwantedness
On one hand, it’s encouraging to see the international community’s outrage over the weekend at what can only be described as the euthanasia of a perfectly healthy, yet—tragically “unwanted”—resident of Copenhagen, Denmark named Marius.
On the other hand, the fact that Marius was an 11-foot-tall giraffe puts things into perspective.
Marius, a giraffe born in captivity, found himself in the lethal position of “unwantedness” by possessing what Animal Rights Sweden called, not “interesting enough,” genes, and his very existence posed the potential threat of inbreeding, which if you’re running a zoo, is apparently problematic.
Despite attempts to spare Marius’ life that included lucrative offers by individuals and at least one European wildlife park, along with “Save Marius” petition that garnered 27,000 signatures, “Marius was fed some rye bread at 9.15am and was killed shortly after by a shot in the head with a bolt gun,” to quote The Guardian of London.
But the kind of civility shown in these rescue efforts—and reflected in the kind of sentence in one of the world’s most respected newspapers that indirectly humanizes a giraffe—was also matched by multiple death threats against zoo officials, one of which threatened the children of two zoo administrators.
It appears the world isn’t buying into the whole idea of “unwanted” after all. At least not where giraffes are concerned.
Two and half years ago, 56 exotic animals broke loose from a private citizen’s backyard in Zanesville, Ohio, leading to what has become known as the “Zanesville Animal Massacre,” which included the killing of 18 rare Bengal tigers.
I was working at a restaurant with a friend of mine that night, and I remember being floored, not so much by the news, but by her reaction. It was the kind of reaction a person and a society tends to have at pivotal moments in history: the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the assassination of President Kennedy, the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.
Might I remind you, Marius and the Zanesville Animal Massacre are both stories about animals.
Is there no corresponding outrage when it comes to human beings?
Worldwide unrest occurs overnight when a zoo takes “unwanted” life. Society shudders at the thought of “massacring” animals that, now on the loose, pose a lethal and immediate threat to human life. Death threats against children are made in the name of the protection of animals.
And yet, the value we set on a human life rests solely on her mother’s decision. “Is my child wanted?”
We don’t allow ourselves the personal and societal outrage that this “choice” by a mother (and often by influences other than the mother herself) leads to the death of over 3,000 human beings every day in the United States alone, but we do allow ourselves outrage when it comes to giraffes and Bengal tigers.
Let me add the caveat here that I love animals. At one point in my life, I proudly subscribed to Cat Fancy, and I’m about 10 times more excited than my 3-year-old daughter every time we visit the Columbus Zoo—where we have an annual pass. I hope she and her baby sister will learn to see every window into God’s glory that giraffes, Bengal tigers, and whitetail deer have to offer. I hope they learn that from me.
Deeper than that, as a believer, I’m convinced by Scripture that my treatment of animals has plenty to say about my heart. I’m thinking here about Proverbs 12:10, which says, “Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, but the mercy of the wicked is cruel.”
But I am bound and determined to make the most of opportunities like Marius’ afford us, to expose the fact that the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes. The elephant is in the room, whether you want him there or not.
Wantedness didn’t change the fact that Marius was a giraffe. Wantedness didn’t determine Marius’ inherent giraffeness. Unwantedness didn’t un-giraffe him, it led to his execution.
If you, Planned Parenthood, or my congressman can explain to me how wantedness determines humanness, I’d like to hear it. Until then, let’s do everything we possibly can to protect life—starting with the humans.
About Heartbeat International
Heartbeat International is the first network of pro-life pregnancy help organizations founded in the U.S. (1971), and now the largest and most expansive network in the world. With 1,800 affiliated pregnancy help locations—including pregnancy help medical clinics (with ultrasound), resource centers, maternity homes, and adoption agencies—Heartbeat serves on all six inhabited continents to provide alternatives to abortion. For more information, see www.HeartbeatInternational.org.
www.Facebook.com/HeartbeatInternational
by Jay Hobbs, Communications Assistant
Love is Our Language
God is faithful!
Wow! What an amazing week!
As the dust settles from our largest Conference to date, we are amazed at all God did last week! Over 900 gathered in Charleston, SC to be trained, equipped, and inspired as we celebrated the fact that "Love is Our Language" in the pregnancy help movement all around the world. None of this would have been possible without YOUR generous support! You have been a blessing to our frontline lifesavers and we thank you for your obedience to God! We offered 13 dynamic workshop tracks to educate and train our participants. We were blessed by amazing keynote speakers such as Dr. Ravi Zacharias, Fr. Agustino Torres, Kirk Walden, Terri Green, and many more! We were also honored to host 32 international guests from 17 countries, representing all six inhabited continents! We want to share a special thank you video from them to you! (Click the image to play). You can see pictures and highlights from the Conference by following us on Facebook today! Thank you again for all you do for LIFE! 
Heartbeat Is Advancing!
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Special Announcement: Heartbeat is Advancing to a New Location |
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Dear Ministry Partner, After over a decade at our current location, Heartbeat International is transitioning to new office space in Columbus, Ohio to better serve our life-saving mission. We are excited for the new season ahead, even while we are neck-deep in moving boxes and packaging tape. Please note our offices will be closed Monday, April 21, and re-opening Tuesday, April 29. We will do our best to return calls and emails as soon as possible, and we thank you ahead of time for your patience. While our address is changing, our phone number will remain the same (614-885-7577 or 888-550-7577) During the transition, Option Line will continue to answer the call 24/7, connecting women in need to their local pregnancy help center. Thank you for partnering with us. You are such a blessing. |
Heartbeat Welcomes Leaders to Institute
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Though the weather has been anything but welcoming, the 17 attendees to Heartbeat's Institute for Center Effectiveness are gaining invaluable insight from the shelter of the great indoors this week in Columbus, Ohio.
Top-notch training from long-time pregnancy help leader Kirk Walden and leadership expert/executive coach Kitty Allen have comprised the week-long event, which has drawn participants from as far away as Southern California and South Carolina--home of Heartbeat's 2014 Annual Conference March 24-27.
The week-long training event includes a tour of Heartbeat International's central operating facilities, including the headquarters for Option Line, Heartbeat's 24/7 pregnancy helpline.
Thank you for helping us bridge the gap!
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News from around the world...
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Jovana and her son, David |
Launching Sarah House For Women
by Vesna Radeka, Executive Director, Choose Life Center
In our pregnancy help ministry, we have experienced the joy of assisting clients who chose to go against the Culture of Death surrounding us, deciding to keep their babies even in the midst of a crisis pregnancy.
While these women would listen to our advice and receive encouragement by our words and whatever help we could provide—including baby clothes, diapers, and money—we would still see them struggle from day to day.
These women are usually young, and do not have the support of either their baby’s father, their families, or both. When we come into contact with them, they are either far along into their pregnancy, or now have a baby up to about three months old.
These women need to be able to work in order to pay their rent, but there are precious few opportunities for a pregnant girl or a new mom to find a job. If they are able to find a job, who will take care of the baby?
Daring to dream up a solution
I am so sad when I think how the first year of motherhood looks for some of these women. But beyond feeling sad about the situation for so many of these, I dare to dream of a better situation for these precious mothers and children.
What if we were able to offer accommodation and care to women in this fragile state, to give them the chance to enjoy being moms? What if this could become a place where moms are coached how to make better life choices, to follow Christ, to change their mind about relationships, to choose to wait, and to learn how to be good moms?
The challenges of realizing our dream
I know this dream could become reality if Christian families were willing to accept pregnant women into their homes. But in Serbia, we face two challenges: First, we have a very small number of vibrant, practicing Christians; and second, our culture largely lives within multigenerational homes—married couples with children, living with in-laws, and usually in small flats.
Social help in Serbia for single moms is around 12.000 dinars, which is around $140 per month. With that income, a single mom can only rent a room, to say nothing of paying bills or putting food on the table.
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In the last two to three years, we at Choose Life Center have had to go beyond our month-to-month budget limits to help women as needs have arisen. Whenever we could, we have helped pay rent, bills, or grocery costs, but this type of care was not planned into our budget, so we had to stretch—and sometimes overextend—for the sake of these moms.
As we’ve gone through these seasons, we have thought and prayed about the direction in which Choose Life Center should develop. Is it to become a medical clinic, offering free ultrasound? Is it preventative services? Developing school programs? A housing ministry?
Slowly, God’s leading became clear to us, and Sarah House For Women began to take shape as a maternity housing ministry, adding to the everyday work we remain committed to doing at Choose Life Center.
Our hope for future impact
In addition to reaching and assisting women in the midst of all the difficulties surrounding a crisis pregnancy, we pray Sarah House For Women will also have a huge impact on how the city officials see us as a Christian organization.
Rather than perceiving our work as threatening or as a nuisance, we pray—and expect—city officials to see that what we are doing really does benefit and bless the whole city.
Who knows? Maybe this new work will allow us to apply for and secure future grants and funds from the government, allowing us to continue reaching and rescuing women in Novi Sad, while renewing communities all over Serbia for life in the years to come.
Help Heartbeat Bridge the Gap
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I have exciting news to share with you! Our pro-life ministry saving over 3,000 babies each week has reached a critical point. We have fallen behind our fiscal year-end budget projections. We must bridge the gap by September 30, 2013. Our goal is to raise $36,722.34 online by September 30, 2013. Here is the exciting news... Every dollar you give to help bridge the gap will be doubled by a matching gift! Your doubled donation will enable us to Reach and Rescue more lives from abortion as we advance the pregnancy help movement around the world! Every dollar is extremely important right now because of the current revenue shortfall we are experiencing. So, again, I urge you: Please be as generous as you possibly can and help us bridge the gap by September 30th. Thank you so much for joining us in this great work! In Christ,
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The Dream Deferred
Fifty years after delivering his iconic, "I Have a Dream" speech, our nation rightly pauses to reflect upon the legacy of Civil Rights pioneer, the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr.
Dr. King's dream was an America where every person was treated with equal dignity, respect, and honor. Fifty years later, Dr. King's dream is still very much a work in process, particularly for our most vulnerable citizens--women facing unexpected pregnancies and their precious, unborn children.
Fifty years after the March on Washington, and 40 years after Roe v. Wade, Heartbeat International and our worldwide network of 1,800 life-affirming pregnancy help locations work hand-in-hand to keep Dr. King's dream alive. Until we see the day where abortion is unwanted and unthinkable for generations to come, Dr. King’s avowal, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” is still a dream deferred.
More...
Evidently, Not so Self-Evident
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
There are perhaps, no better known or rehearsed words in American history than these, which are embedded in the foundational document of the United States.
In the Declaration of Independence, the framers articulated two self-evident truths:
- All men are created equal, and
- Those men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, starting with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Those are possibly some of the most profound and meaningful words ever penned.
However, we also know that on the face of this profound and meaningful document itself, the words, and presumably the inalienable rights, applied only to certain men. One of those inalienable rights—the right to vote, to sway the system of government—belonged only to men.
Gender inequality: All men are created equal…
If owning property or just about anything else is an inalienable right, then women were denied that right as well.
In a letter to her husband, John Adams, in 1776, Abigail Adams wrote, "in the new Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make I desire you would Remember the Ladies." His answer: "As to your extraordinary Code of Laws, I cannot but laugh… We know better than to repeal our masculine systems."
Appealing to her husband’s sense of fairness and desire for liberty for all, Abigail Adams wrote again, “I can not say that I think you very generous to the Ladies, for whilst you are proclaiming peace and good will to Men, Emancipating all Nations, you insist upon retaining an absolute power over Wives."
This appeal fell on apparently deaf ears.
And so it was that women could not vote or be elected as presidents, senators, or anything else until 1920 by virtue of the 19th Amendment. From 1776 to 1920, it was clearly not self-evident that women had inalienable rights.
[Related: Saving Lives Now with a Winning Strategy, by Jeanneane Maxon]
Racial inequality: All men are created equal…
We further know that at the time those words were penned, non-landowners, African Americans, and those deemed too young (under 18) were specifically excluded not only from voting, but from other inalienable rights as well. In fact, some colonies, in 1776, prohibited any of these classes of people not only from owning land, but in some cases, from owning a gun, joining the militia, or owning real property.
Evidently, when the framers wrote that it was a self-evident truth that all men are created equal, they were really referring only to white, land-holding men. It was evidently not so self-evident that God created all people—men and women, black and white, slave and free, rich and poor—with unalienable rights.
Naral Attacks
Pregnancy centers face new round of attacks
This month we celebrate the birth of a nation, along with the freedom and liberty this nation represents. But as we celebrate these freedoms let us not forget the lethal danger threatening the lives of our most innocent citizens.
You can stand with Heartbeat to defend these innocent American lives by partnering with us today.
Just this week, NARAL Pro-Choice, one of the largest pro-abortion groups in the U.S., launched an attack on pregnancy help centers in the form of a new "investigative" report. This report spews propaganda while twisting facts to make pregnancy help centers appear to be a dangerous threat to the health of women.
But there is one fact that no one can deny: NO ONE has ever died in a pregnancy help center.
This new attack on pregnancy help centers comes at a strategic time. Pro-abortion groups are desperate to deflect attention away from recent findings of their clinics' fatal practices nationwide. No life is safe inside an abortion clinic, including the life of the mother.
These attacks on our life-saving centers are nothing new. We have overcome them in the past and we will continue to overcome them in the future, with your help.
Here is what you can do to defend our most innocent citizens:
- Pray for our nation! As the attacks on those who defend life grow increasingly stronger, we must join in unity and prayer for our nation and those who strive to promote abortion in our land.
- Partner with Heartbeat International. We work tirelessly to bring life-saving help to women facing an unexpected pregnancy through our 24/7 contact center, Option Line, and through our network of 1,800 life-affirming ministries worldwide. With your support we will continue to do this work and see our nation changed, one life at a time.
- Volunteer at your local center. Show your support for your local center in a very practical way. Donate time and resources today. You can locate your center by clicking here.
Heartbeat reaches 1,800 affiliates with New Partnership
We are proud to announce an exciting new partnership with Italy-based pro-life organization, Movimento per la Vita. The collaborative partnership adds 398 new affiliates to the Heartbeat International family, bolstering our position as the largest network of pro-life pregnancy help organizations in the world, with 1,800 affiliates.
We are able to expand and reach new regions of the earth because of YOUR support!
“We are very pleased to announce this partnership with Movimento per la Vita,” said Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D., in her 21st year as president of Heartbeat International. “We already share so much in common with these friends, and I personally look forward to what we will learn from them as our relationship grows.”
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Our agreement with Movimento per la Vita was officially signed by the organization’s founder, Carlo Casini, at Italy’s March for Life in Rome on May 13, amid 40,000 marchers, including newly elected Pope Francis.
Founded in 1975, Movimento per la Vita—much like Heartbeat International—was founded to provide women with abortion alternatives three years before the procedure was legalized in its country, and now includes 338 pregnancy centers and 60 maternity homes, providing life-affirming help to women and families in need.
Movimento per la Vita also operates a pregnancy helpline, SOS Vita, which connects 
women facing difficult situations involving unexpected pregnancies to local centers, referred to as Centri di aiuto alla Vita (CaV).
The helpline operated by Movimento per la Vita distinctly parallels Heartbeat International’s Option Line®, a 24/7 call center connecting women and men facing unexpected pregnancies with real-time help and face-to-face contact with local pregnancy help centers.
We are very excited about this new partnership and all of the opportunities it represents. We pray that, with YOUR continued partnership, God would cause us to continue advancing the pregnancy help movement around the world!
NYC Baby Saved by Option Line
The phone rang at Heartbeat's Option Line. Anastacia answered, eager to listen and counsel the caller on the line. Nothing could have prepared her for what happened next.
Lori (age 18) was on the other end of the line. Lori had just given birth to a baby girl alone early that morning. Now she was calling from outside of a hospital in NYC where she planned to leave the baby but she didn't want to be seen. Desperate for help, Lori called Option Line.
Anastacia asked Lori how she was doing and if the baby had been fed. Lori answered that she didn't have milk and didn't know how to breast feed. Anastacia could hear the 
baby "cooing" over the phone.
It was now early evening, many hours after Lori gave birth, and the baby was in dire need of food and medical attention. Anastacia instructed Lori to stay put while she called for help. Through Option Line's connection to Safe Haven in NYC, the baby was rescued and admitted to the hospital within a couple of hours.
Later that evening, a representative from Safe Haven called Anastacia to let her know that all was well and the baby was doing just fine!
If not for Heartbeat's Option Line that precious baby girl may not have survived.
Option Line is available 24/7 to answer calls, texts, chats, and emails from women in distress, just like Lori. Option Line provides the help women need at the moment they need it most.
Heartbeat's Option Line exists because of faithful partners, like you. You can ensure that the next call will be answered.
Your gift will reach and rescue lives from abortion today! Thank you for partnering with us in this great work.
