Anti-Abortion Group Marches at Clinic : Protest: Pregnant women enter the facility, passing protesters offering help, including adoption services.

Graphic anti-abortion posters carried by protesters outside a health clinic Saturday belied the gentle messages that some of the more than 200 participants quietly voiced to pregnant women coming and going during the demonstration.

“If you ever need any help, or if any of the gals you know ever need anything, you give us a call,” said Rick, a sidewalk counselor for Operation Rescue (who withheld his surname), speaking in soft, earnest tones to a young woman as she was leaving the Family Planning Associates facility. He said that although the woman said she wasn’t pregnant, he wanted to let her know that if she was, the group could offer whatever she needed--a temporary home, medical care, counseling, parents to adopt her baby--if she chose not to have an abortion.

The demonstration was one of eight in Southern California to show solidarity with the D.C. Project, a three-day political and informational workshop for anti-abortion adherents in Washington.

“There are people with homes who will take in a girl with an unwanted pregnancy, and they’ll help her get on her feet again,” said Le Ann John, a spokeswoman for Operation Rescue in Orange County. John was one of two spokesmen for the group on Saturday. “Right here, there are people who would adopt right now--I’d take one (baby) in a minute.”

Father Leo John Celano, a teacher at St. Michael’s Abbey in El Toro and the other official spokesperson for the group, said those picketing had been called upon by God to help prevent abortions.

“We have actually been impelled by the Holy Spirit to join in solidarity to save the slaughter of the innocents. . . . These are crimes against humanity, and that’s why we’re here: to rescue those children who are being dragged to the slaughter.”

Celano led the group in prayer and blessings throughout the five hours of picketing, while other leaders of the group initiated prayer-like chants such as “Shut the Door, Keep Out the Devil.” A few guitarists strummed as group members sang “Amazing Grace” and other songs.

About 30 women entered the health facility on Chapman Avenue. Most were with boyfriends and few seemed interested in the Operation Rescue pickets. Some women whisked their cars into the driveway to avoid waiting pickets, while others accepted the handout literature and continued to their appointments. About eight Family Planning Associates security guards and two Orange police officers helped to escort a few of the more intimidated visitors.

Spokesmen for the facility on Saturday refused to comment on anything else relating to the event.

Jan Cady, a spokeswoman for the National Organization for Women in Orange County, said the Orange County Pro-Choice Coalition chose not to counter the pickets.

“We feel that Operation Rescue hasn’t really accomplished anything since its inception in California--except to cost the taxpayers a lot of money,” Cady said.

A 17-year-old Mission Viejo High School senior named Dave (who asked to withhold his surname) was smoking a cigarette outside while he waited for his 15-year-old girlfriend to have her abortion. The two have dated for about six months without using birth control, but Dave said that from now on, they would.

“At least they’re not violent or nothing,” he said about the picketers. He said they were told that a group would be outside the facility the day his girlfriend was scheduled to have her abortion, and it worried them. “I didn’t expect to see this many. . . . It’s what she was afraid of most--these people.”

A 20-year-old woman, who had just had an abortion and asked not to be identified, had tears in her eyes as she walked with her friends to their car. “They have no business telling anybody what to do with their lives,” she said. “I think they can do a lot better things with their lives than aggravate people like this.”