by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist
Even though this is the time of year when the vulgar Vagina Monologues launches it’s Valentine’s Day “V-Day” campaign on college campuses across the country, this year an alternative is being offered that celebrates authentic femininity.
According to Zenit News, Epiphany Productions, a Catholic-Christian theater arts company, is launching an alternative to the Vagina Monologues’ radical feminist and lesbian message with a drama extolling the virtues of womanhood and the gift of human sexuality.
“ . . . (W)hile the one play exalts many of the ideologies of the radical feminist movement, as well as cultural or moral relativism, we are trying to counteract these things,” said Epiphany founder Jeremy Stanbary, who performs the play along with his wife Sarah.
“We do this through a drama based on true stories that expose abortion and how it is not good for women; we show that in fact it is quite devastating in the lives of millions of men and women.”
Everything in the drama comes from a real person’s testimony, Stanbary says. “We’ve pulled from a lot of different testimonies, piecing things together to make the play work theatrically, but everything you hear in the play comes from a real person.”
Stanbary wants people to hear these true stories in order to dispel the lies and myths that the abortion industry continues to spew, such as telling women a young fetus is just a “clump of cells.”
“This is one of the things I was most shocked by in doing my research and interviews for this play: what it is really like inside of a clinic and how biased the so-called counselors in these places really are,” he said.
His play uses the powerful device of personal testimonies to dispel these lies and reach out to women who have been harmed by these deceptions. Although he doesn’t know how, “they end up in the audience somehow,” he said.
”Or at least the people who know them come to see the drama. And if this play can provide the insights and the understanding that they need to help family or friends eventually come to terms with the negative effects of their abortion and find healing and hope, then we count that as a great success for this play.”
Resources for abortion survivors are available in both the play program and at product tables at all performances.
Stanbary and his wife will appear on this Thursday’s Life on the Rock show on EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network). The network is also planning to make a studio recording which will be televised later this year.
Thus far, the play has been performed in the Diocese of Phoenix with the full support of Bishop Thomas Olmstead.
“He expressed his opinion that there is a tremendous need for this play, and said that he is excited to see it getting out to more and more audiences,” Stanbary said. “So we are receiving great feedback and a lot of support.”
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