Equipped for Life Podcast

Emily pulls back the curtain to explain the ways that her club leaders established a good working relationship with their administration, dealt with vandalism, connected with the pro-choice club, and more! 00:00 Introduction 02:11 Coaching other clubs 04:26 Managing a club's image 07:24 Dealing with vandalism 29:36 The importance of outreach 31:03 Campus rules for outreach 46:34 Explaining why you...

Now that she has talked about the initial outreach mistakes the Oles for Life club at St. Olaf made, Emily discusses their initial dialogue mistakes. Toward the beginning, she blows Josh's mind by explaining how many of their member's musical backgrounds made it easier for them to critique each other without anyone's feelings getting hurt. (We bet this same thing applies to lots of artists and oth...

Our regular listeners have heard by now about the great successes of Oles for Life, the pro-life student club at St. Olaf College. In this episode, Emily Albrecht pulls the curtain back to share five mistakes their club made when they began doing outreach. This episode will be followed by one on specific dialogue mistakes they made during their outreaches. Chapters: 00:00 - Introducing the topic;...

Josh Brahm interviews comedian Josh Harris about how he got into sidewalk counseling, how he uses humor on the sidewalk, and some practical tips for you to use to add more humor and friendliness to your conversations about abortion! Chapters: 0:00 Introducing Josh Harris; 03:23 How a Comedian Began Sidewalk Counseling; 08:45 Humor in pro-life dialogues; 13:00 Combining humor with compliments; 31:3...

Josh Brahm and Jacob Nels, ERI's Sidewalk Counseling Trainer, finish reacting to videos sent in by Rebekah Dyer while sidewalk counseling. If you haven't seen part one yet, please watch that first for more context: https://youtu.be/rqdQO_nFsGg PARENTAL ADVISORY NOTE: Unlike the previous episode, the videos we review in this episode include very strong language. We chose not to censor it. If you li...

Josh Brahm brings Jacob Nels, ERI's Sidewalk Counseling Trainer, to react to videos sent in by Rebekah Dyer while sidewalk counseling. Rebekah works with Justice For All , which includes her sidewalk counseling, and has benefitted from our Sidewalk Counseling Masterclass. Rebekah has had multiple run-ins with police and private security officers while counseling near an abortion facility in Califo...

We bring you the extended interview of Emily Albrecht (our newest team member!) from the recent ERI Pajama Gala. Emily explains how she got involved in the pro-life movement, and how her campus club used their training from the Equipped for Life Course to transform the culture at St. Olaf, from one where they hated pro-lifers to one where pro-lifers are respected. 0:00: Introduction; 04:34: Interv...

Jordan Warfel is our guest today because he discovered a conspiracy theory that NARAL promoted in a recent virtual conference. The theory is based on a book by Ilyse Hogue that argues the pro-life movement doesn't actually care about babies, but is a front for evangelicals to bring back racial segregation. The discussion includes the horrible dialogue advice NARAL is giving, how both sides often c...

It's our first podcast with Emily Albrecht, the co-president of St. Olaf Students for Life and our next speaker/writer/coach! Josh and Emily discuss the recent HBO film "Unpregnant" because there are themes taught in this movie that may influence some of your conversations with pro-choice people who have seen it. ***SPOILER ALERT*** If you would like to watch the film before listening to our comme...

Josh Brahm interviews Ali Rak, an incredibly effective community organizer and activist in Maryland, to explain the nuts and bolts of how she gets people involved in contacting their political representatives in order to accomplish pro-life goals. 0:00: Introducing Ali and the topic; 13:14: Why apologetics training is important for lobbyists; 15:20: What Ali does as a lobbyist and community organi...

*Republishing with the correct spelling of Julie's last name.* Josh interviews Family Therapist Julie Dodson to discuss the "Showing Understanding Skill" technique she's been trained in. Pro-life advocates can use this skill to grow in their empathy and navigate conversations better, especially the ones that turn to particularly emotional aspects of the abortion debate. The four steps are: 1: List...

Josh interviews Gary Freeman from Care Net. They talk about how Gary went from being a preacher's kid to serving fathers in pregnancy centers, including the struggles of trying to figure out the best way to do that! 0:00: Introduction / Gary's story; 8:02: Gary starts serving men in pregnancy center work; 20:08: What Gary did to help guys open up in these situations and begin training other center...

Content warning: This conversation necessarily includes some thought experiments that relate to sexual abuse, as well as the real-world example of Jeffrey Epstein. As usual, the discussion isn't graphic, but we want our listeners who are survivors of sexual assault to know that and make an informed decision of whether they want to listen to this episode or not. It's Rachel's last episode! She and...

Josh and Rachel discuss the common pro-choice phrase, "consent to sex is not consent to pregnancy" in greater detail than we covered in our recent video on the "Abortion as Self-Defense" argument. There is a version of this argument that is so strong, Rachel says she would use it if she were pro-choice! There are both strong pro-life responses to that argument, and there are also some really cring...

Josh and Rachel share several observations they've recently made about what is REALLY going on when pro-choice advocates bring up the topic of rape, they may completely change the way you think about those discussions! They also include why Josh makes sure that he covers that topic in speeches in front of mixed audiences, as well as some thoughts for church youth leaders on the topic. You don't wa...

***Reposting this podcast with fixed audio. We had a glitch when we rendered this one in Premiere Pro where it sounded fine in the program, but the rendered file had a terrible audio echo. Josh missed it because he was in a hurry and didn't check the rendered file before uploading, and then went on sabbatical. Sorry about that! Now we know to not skip that quality control check. Because of the nat...

Josh, Rachel, and Elijah Thompson from Dank Pro-Life Memes discuss the various ways pro-life advocates tend to define the word "abortion," and how this can be confusing to pro-choice people. They also talk about tips for responding to life of the mother cases, and explain how some pro-choice advocates mean something completely different than we think when they ask about that. Related Links: "Abort...

This audio comes from a training video available on the Equal Rights Institute YouTube channel. Sources: Sophie Lewis Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=jMGptJXz618&feature=emb_logo Maternal mortality rates in the United States in 2016 according to the CDC: https://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/maternal-mortality/pregnancy-mortality-surveillance-system.htm#ratio Appendecto...

Josh and Rachel interview Elijah Thompson from Dank Pro-Life Memes to compare and contrast his messaging with ERI's. Topics include the potential value of snark, whether it's possible to make memes that aren't strawmen, whether Dank Pro-Life Memes feeds people's vice, and Elijah even responds to a question from a pro-choice follower who is critical of Dank Pro-Life Meme's work. 00:00: Introducing...

This is the audio from a 3-part video series we recently released on scientism. Read the article versions: Part 1: Scientism: the Self-Refuting Argument that has Contaminated Abortion Dialogue Part 2: The Limitations of Science in the Abortion Debate: Why You Need Philosophy Part 3: Scientism is Not Only Self-Refuting, but Dangerous Sources: Find "Scientism and Secularism" by JP Moreland on Amazon...

After the entire ERI staff watched the "AKA Jane Roe" documentary, we processed our thoughts together and in this nearly unedited discussion, Josh and Rachel offer their analysis of the film, including: Why this story is relevant to pro-choice people and shouldn't be brushed away by pro-life advocates; A video editor's take on whether the documentary was deceptively edited or merely biased; Why ge...

Josh Brahm interviews Isaac Saul, political journalist and founder of Tangle, an independent, ad-free, non-partisan politics newsletter that offers both sides of the biggest news stories every day. They start by discussing Isaac's background and the experiences that led him to attempt to create a truly non-partisan, fair, political newsletter. They then talk about common problems in the media, how...

Rachel Crawford interviews Jacob Nels from ERI's Sidewalk Counseling Masterclass. Topics include: - Should sidewalk counselors talk about adoption with abortion-minded women? - How to accurately keep track of lives saved vs. "hopefuls"; - How there is no silver bullet or "perfect words" that work for everybody. Sidewalk Counseling Masterclass: http://SidewalkCounselingMasterclass.com The "9 Myths...

Josh and Rachel discuss a new outreach table question that the ERI team tested during a college visit in South Carolina. Visit the blog to read the article and see the abortion fact sheet they used: http://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/how-college-students-responded-to-questions-about-3rd-trimester-abortions

During Josh's speaking trip in Ireland he sat down with Ben Conroy and Muireann Lynch from The Minimise Project, an awesome young pro-life organization. They talk about how abortion recently became legal in Ireland, dealing with different factions of the pro-life movement, and an awesome story about using the Equal Rights Argument to stump a bunch of students, Excuse the lower than usual audio qua...