Protests, Facebook & the Anglican Mission

Katelin Hogard, Contributor

“Get your bible off my body” and “our body our choice” were just a few of the chants heard outside Urban Abbey on the evening of February 23rd. 

PC: Paige Mairi

The Thunder Bay Right to Life organization screened the film Unplanned at Urban Abbey. Protests broke out, anger filled the air, and words were said on both sides. In Canada, a place where abortion is accessible to any woman needing or wanting one, one has to ask, why is this issue surfacing?

Right to Life board member Cindy Harasen spoke on behalf of the organization, telling The Argus: “our intention was simply to make the film available for all to see [and] to give people in Thunder Bay… an opportunity to see the film if they wished to do so.”

Paige Mairi was at the protests and said, “It’s crazy to think that it’s 2020 and there’s all different types of identities within this crowd of protestors… and [the people there to see the film] were trying to make us feel like we were in the wrong and using their religion as a power.” Like Mairi, this issue hits close for many, regardless of which side of the debate they are on.

Marianne Brown, former Thunder Bay resident and staunch LGBTQ2S+ advocate commented, “The younger crowd got a hold of [the screening] and that was the focus of the protest: Urban Abbey presenting itself as a safe, open, hip, free… place, but this is what they do. This is what they did.”

Brown grew up in Thunder Bay and now lives in Annapolis Valley, N.S. Prior to her relocating she was in Thunder Bay from 2009-2019 after spending time in B.C. She has kept eyes on the work Urban Abbey does within the city.

Since the screening, the controversy now lies in the response from Urban Abbey and what will happen going forward.

Following the protests and extreme backlash after the event, Scotland Morrison, Urban Abbey’s head of staff, took to their Facebook page saying he “wrongly assumed that a film that was deeply personal would also be private in nature [and] was made aware of the public nature of the event only after the Abbey began to receive feedback from the community.”

When speaking with Harasen from Right to Life, it’s a different story. “Our contact at Urban Abbey was, in our first correspondences when discussing the availability of their space, informed that this was a public screening,” she said.

On January 30th, Right to Life published the event to their public Facebook page and for two weeks prior to the event, ran a post in the Chronicle Journal’s “What’s On” section four days a week.

“Certainly, based on our own advertising efforts it is clear that at no point were we trying to hide the fact that this was an event open to the public… we wanted people to know about it so they could choose to attend if they wished to do so.”

While Scotland Morrison vehemently denies to comment on Urban Abbey’s stance on subject-matter so sensitive, such as pro-life or LGBTQ2S+ issues, this is not the first time Right to Life has used their space. In 2018 they screened the pro-life documentary Fatal Flaws. 

“Kimberley Morrison [Scotland Morrison’s mother], the former leader at Urban Abbey, also spoke at our Thunder Bay Right to Life Youth Conference a number of years ago as well,” Cindy Harasen confirms.

After an event filled with so much controversy, it seems the community is at a stand-still. 

Brown lived near Urban Abbey when it first opened and says, “they were presented to the community of Thunder Bay as an arts center and I lived nearby and I saw that it said Anglican mission in Canada on their sign.”

Urban Abbey, though denying this, is still listed as part of the Anglican Mission in Canada -- a mission known for its anti LGBTQ2S+ beliefs and pro-life stance. 

They have also hosted the conservative Archbishop of Rwanda, Emmanuel Kolini, who has called same-sex marriage blessings a genocide.

Abortion is a hotly contested topic of conversation that isn’t disappearing. Through films and social media, protests and conversations, it seems abortion will always be something to discuss, regardless of which side is screaming the loudest. And while protests erupted over which side is the right side, Urban Abbey stayed silent. 

The Argus has not received a comment from Urban Abbey at this time.