The Deacon's Bench
If you want a glimpse at what pro-life activists can face today, click on the video in the tweet below. It includes video shot outside a Planned Parenthood clinic last week, where a lone woman was performing the dangerous and clearly threatening act of silently praying the rosary.
WATCH: Pennsylvania State Representative @BrianSimsPA harasses an elderly woman who is peacefully advocating for the lives of preborn human beings and women who are considering abortion.
This is shameful. https://t.co/Xb9pkFZSXC
— Live Action (@LiveAction) May 5, 2019
About Brian Sims:
Brian K. Sims (born September 16, 1978) is a Democratic member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in the 182nd district. Elected in 2012, Sims is also a lawyer and activist on LGBT civil rights.Sims is the first openly gay elected state legislator in Pennsylvania history. He won reelection on November 6, 2018.
Sims was born in Washington, D.C., the son of two Army Lieutenant Colonels of Irish descent. Sims was raised in the Roman Catholic Church but stopped attending church at the age of 16. Sims lived in seventeen states before settling in Pennsylvania in the early 1990s. He later completed his undergraduate studies at Bloomsburg University, in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania in 2001. In 2000, Sims was the co-captain of the Bloomsburg University football team, and was recognized as a scholar athlete. During the 2000 season, the longest season in the Division II school’s history, Sims came out as gay to his teammates. In doing so, the regional All-American and team captain became the only openly gay college football captain in NCAA history.
In 2004, Sims earned a J.D. Degree in International and Comparative law at the Michigan State University School of Law.
Behold, the tolerance of those who rail against intolerance.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us now and at the hour of our death, Amen.
UPDATE: A columnist at Philly.com, Christine Flowers, has weighed in.
Excerpt:
I was horrified by Sims’ video, because, as a Catholic and a defender of the unborn, I believe it is this woman’s right to pray anywhere she wants. But I was also concerned, because it runs counter to my past experience with Sims.
Shortly after Sims won his election in 2012, I interviewed him for an article in the Daily News. I came away impressed with his interest in bipartisanship. At the time, I wrote that we disagreed on many issues but that, “Sims is one of the more principled and collaborative public servants I’ve encountered in my half-century on earth, most of it spent in this beloved cesspool known as Philadelphia.” I also noted: “As Sims once put it, he’s trying to find empathy for people who disagree with him.”
In that interview, Sims told me that “The idea of not even changing a mind, but being able to work with a mind that is unchanging or work with a mind that is opposed to yours, you need to understand it. It sounds very elementary, and it’s something that we talk a lot about around here, the idea that nothing should be revolutionary about the idea that you have to understand the people that you work with. But somehow that seems revolutionary of late in this sort of modern discussion of American politics.”
I’m trying to figure out how that statement fits with what I saw on Sims’ own video — and with the 3-week-old video I found on his Facebook page in which he offers $100 to “anyone who can identify” the people whom he calls “pseudo-Christian protesters.”
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