Silent No More Speaks Out in NYC!

"You're in the wrong city!" shouted one woman. BUT, many people had a positive response.

New York City hardly notices a handful or two of visitors, except when they are the brave, post-abortive women and men who took to the sidewalks between 6th and 49th Streets near Radio City on Tuesday, September 18, at Noon. The orderly Silent No More demonstration, scheduled in advance, was there with microphones and button-wearing supporters holding signs that said, "Women Do Regret Abortion," and "I Regret Lost Fatherhood." It was a day with glorious sunshine and summer temperatures. But even the best weather could not make it easy for this growing and courageous group who have lost children to abortion and who choose to share - right in the heart of Manhattan's lunchtime crowds - their personal stories of grief and loss, hope and healing. All with the hope that the truth will help keep others from an abortion they will regret the rest of their lives. Colleen Berry, Theresa Bonopartis, and Janet Morana were primary organizers and participants who shared their painfully personal stories of abortion and its aftermath in their lives. The presence of post-abortive fathers lent especially poignant, often ignored, emotion to the witness.

There was a young French documentary filmmaker who stayed the entire time, asking in-depth questions to participants in line about abortion, why they came today, and what they hoped to accomplish politically. One woman holding a sign told him she could not interview right now. He said how can you expect to get political change if we do not talk about the politics. "I want to help you, he said, why won't you talk?"

A representative from the Hudson Valley Coalition for Life who was standing nearby overheard the exchange and told him that this is the witness part of the day. "What they are saying right now is important for you to hear - for everyone to hear," she said. "Look, they're glad you're here, but you want to talk about the politics of abortion. What is being said here, right now, is what you should be listening to and reporting on as well. It is what is never reported. This is a funeral of sorts, and we are being asked to listen to eulogies being spoken for their dead, aborted children. You'll get your other questions answered, just not right now. It's about respect for a life."

 

"You're delusional - what you need to get is a brain," a large, hulking man said in passing to the diminutive Brigid Faranda, shown here with one of the several policeman on hand to keep order.

Rockefeller Center's Atlas thinks he's carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. With 47 million abortions in this country and with New York in the top three states leading in the number of abortions performed, it would seem the real heavy lifting, physically and emotionally, is being done by formerly lost-in-the-crowd post abortive men and women. Thankfully, they are "Silent No More!"

Oh, we are in the right city, alright. We are in the right city.

Comments

[Eileen Peterson]

We in Rockland County were praying for the Silent No Longer witness in New York City. God Bless those with the courage to stand naked in public and share their greatest wound. We cannot destroy the human body but, the abortions industry cannot destroy a divine soul. It is in the remembering that the healing comes. Please come and witness at the 40 Days for Life in Rockland County. We so need you.

[Theresa]

just for the record...neither Colleen or Janet are post abortive, but Colleen has been gracious enough to do all the leg work for SNM here in NY...