It was standing room only on Tuesday night at Focus on the Family’s 4th annual SeeLife event, with more than 1,100 in-person attendees at the organization’s Colorado Springs campus and over 30,000 online viewers.

The evening opened to the sound of a baby’s heartbeat amplified throughout the event center as an ultrasound video gave visual witness to the miraculous development of a baby in the womb from the first heartbeat to 40 weeks gestation.

Dove Award-winning singer and songwriter Phil Wickham performed many well-known Christian songs and led the audience in a powerful time of worship.

Keynote speaker, Ben Shapiro, hit it out of the park as he debunked the eight most egregious abortion myths of our day.

The first myth is the proposition that abortion is a right. Shapiro said that’s just not true. There is no right to an abortion in the U.S. Constitution. He told the crowd, “There’s no such definition of a right that would encompass the right to kill another human being. The first freedom is the freedom to life. There is only one scientific answer as to when life begins, and the answer is at conception.”

The second myth is that preborn babies aren’t really human persons. In response, Shapiro argued that at conception, a unique human life comes into being. He said that human life should be synonymous with personhood because drawing the line anywhere else, like viability, would legitimize the murder of people who cannot take care of themselves.

Third, the left likes to argue that it is responsible to abort, especially if a woman is just not ready for a baby. In response, Shapiro rhetorically asked the audience, “Well, guess who else isn’t ready to have a baby? Any parent in the history of mankind.” He argued, just because something is hard doesn’t mean killing another human being is a responsible action. It’s immoral.

The fourth myth Shapiro addressed is the proposition that only women should have a say about abortion. He said this argument assumes that because women bear the brunt of childbearing that only their opinion matters. But according to this logic, Shapiro retorted, only men should have a say in frontline military matters because only men bear the brunt of frontline military fighting. Shapiro said this leftist argument for abortion is completely dismissive of the full picture of childbearing and childrearing.

Fifth, the left likes to argue that abortion should be allowed for rape and incest. Shapiro’s response to this argument was that rape and incest are extraordinarily rare and only account for 1% of abortions. He passionately argued that one evil crime does not justify committing another evil crime. Punish the rapist, but don’t kill the baby.

The sixth abortion myth Shapiro addressed was the “but it’s my body” argument. To which Shapiro replied, you are a creator to your child, and you have a moral duty to care for it. “Abortion,” he contended, “is not passive. It is violently ending somebody else’s life.”

Seventh, the left likes to accuse the pro-life movement of condemning women to dangerous illegal abortions. Shapiro says that stats do not support this argument, and it is simply fear-mongering by abortion supporters.

Finally, the eighth abortion myth Shapiro debunked was the famous hypothetical the left uses to try and prove that embryos have no moral worth. In the hypothetical, a building is on fire, and you can only save the trapped five-year-old or a box of embryos. The left argues that you would save the five-year-old, and that is evidence that embryos are not morally valuable. Shapiro says this type of argument is not helpful because you can always “construct a hypothetical to come to your preferred conclusion,” and it creates false choices. “In abortion,” he argued, “you aren’t choosing between objects; you are just choosing what you wish to do with a human life that already exists.”

Shapiro told the audience that culture tells us to do whatever we want, but that’s subjective individualism, and it is a lie. Instead, Shapiro encouraged the audience to embrace duty and responsibility. “Human life deserves protection at every single stage,” he said, “and we have to fight to protect it.”

The audience enthusiastically received Shapiro’s message as they stood to their feet in applause at its conclusion.

In addition to rallying those in the pro-life movement, SeeLife is also meant to equip individuals to live out their pro-life values by practically getting involved in the work of pro-life organizations. In-person attendees had the opportunity to learn more about many of these organizations at the event. If you are interested in connecting with a pro-life group in your community, consider these organizations doing great work!

If you missed the event last night and would like to view it in its entirety, you can do that here.