According to the Alliance Defending Freedom, an Englishwoman has been arrested and charged on four criminal counts after she told the police, who questioned why she was standing on a public street near an abortion facility, that she might be praying silently.
Police approached Isabel Vaughan-Spruce, who was standing near an abortion clinic in Birmingham, England. Vaughan-Spruce was carrying no sign and remained completely silent until approached by officers. Police had received complaints from an onlooker who suspected that Vaughan-Spruce was praying silently in her mind.
“It’s abhorrently wrong that I was searched, arrested, interrogated by police and charged, simply for praying in the privacy of my own mind. . . . I was exercising my freedom of thought, my freedom of religion, inside the privacy of my own mind. Nobody should be criminalised for thinking and for praying, in a public space in the UK,” said Vaughan-Spruce.
The censorship zone measure, introduced by Birmingham authorities, criminalizes individuals perceived to be “engaging in any act of approval or disapproval or attempted act of approval or disapproval” in relation to abortion, including through “verbal or written means, prayer or counseling…”.
Vaughan-Spruce had stood near the abortion facility while it was closed on three occasions, in which she says she “might” have been praying. While in police custody, Vaughan-Spruce was shown pictures of herself outside the abortion facility and asked whether she was praying at these specific moments, or whether these had been taken at times that she was distracted and thought about other things, such as her lunch.
“Isabel’s experience should be deeply concerning to all those who believe that our hard-fought fundamental rights are worth protecting. It is truly astonishing that the law has granted local authorities such wide and unaccountable discretion, that now even thoughts deemed “wrong” can lead to a humiliating arrest and a criminal charge,” said Jeremiah Igunnubole, an attorney with the Alliance Defending Freedom UK, which is defending Vaughan-Spruce.
“A mature democracy should be able to differentiate between criminal conduct and the peaceful exercise of constitutionally protected rights. Isabel, a woman of good character who has tirelessly served her community by providing charitable assistance to vulnerable women and children, has been treated no better than a violent criminal. The recent increase in buffer zone legislation and orders is a watershed moment in our country.”
As part of her conditions for bail, Vaughan-Spruce was told that she must not contact a local Catholic priest who was also involved in pro-life work – a condition that was later dropped.
Vaughan-Spruce is the Director of the UK March for Life and has volunteered for many years in support of women in crisis pregnancies.
“I have devoted much of my life to supporting women in crisis pregnancies with everything that they need to make an empowered choice for motherhood. I am also involved in supporting women who have had abortions and are struggling with the consequences of it. I’ve grown close to many of the women I’ve been able to support over the years, and it breaks my heart to know that so many more go through this every day,” said Vaughan-Spruce.
“My faith is a central part of who I am, so sometimes I’ll stand or walk near an abortion facility and pray about this issue. This is something I’ve done pretty much every week for around the last 20 years of my life. I pray for my friends who have experienced abortion, and for the women who are thinking about going through it themselves,” she continued.
Her arrest follows another recent incident in Bournemouth where a woman was told to leave by local authorities for praying, even outside of the local censorship zone.
Last year, a grandmother from Liverpool successfully overturned her charge on human rights grounds after she was arrested and fined for praying silently near an abortion facility on a walk during lockdown.
Although the Birmingham city ordinance is local, the Tory government is considering mandating censorship zones throughout England and Wales. Clause 9 of the Public Order Bill, currently under parliamentary debate, would prohibit pro-life volunteers from “influencing,” “advising,” “persuading,” “informing,” “expressing opinion,” or even “occupying space” within the vicinity of an abortion facility. The proposed national legislation would carry a penalty of two years in prison.
At 150 meters, the proposed national censorship zones would be much larger than a soccer pitch or a football field. To visualize the distance involved, if one goalkeeper on his line were to pray for the other goalkeeper on his line (115 meters apart), that is less than 150 meters and would be an offense.
The proposed national statute is not necessary. A 2018 government inquiry into the work of pro-life volunteers found that instances of harassment are rare, and police already have powers to prosecute individuals engaging in harassment. The most common activities were quiet or silent prayer, or offering leaflets about charitable support available to women who would like to consider alternative options to abortion.
“This happened in Great Britain, which is governed by the Tories. Astonishing, and hideous. Abortion is so sacred to the British government that one is not allowed to address God silently outside an abortion clinic.
Post-Christian Britain is quite a place. Over a decade ago, I became friends with an English Catholic woman who loves her native country, but who emigrated to America with her American husband because she wanted to raise her children in a country where they would have a fighting chance at holding on to their faith. She left behind a beautiful family house and centuries of heritage there, all for her faith. She really did believe that the pressure on her kids to apostatize would be hard for them to bear. I see now what she meant by that.”
The right to end the lives of the unborn is by far the single most important issue to the global Left, including the Democrats in America. It really is sacred to them, a sacrament of their secular religion/ideology. They are deadly serious about destroying anyone who, even within the confines of his own mind, might potentially interfere with the slaughter of the unborn.
