Author Archives

Emily Geiger

Director of Education & Outreach

Emily Geiger is Director of Education & Outreach at Equal Rights Institute. She is the former Co-President of Oles for Life at St. Olaf College, where she worked to transform campus culture using ERI’s apologetics to foster respectful and productive dialogues about abortion. At ERI, she is using her educational background to write, develop curriculum, and teach pro-life advocates how to change minds, save lives, and promote a culture of life in their communities. A sought-after speaker, Emily frequently presents lectures on college campuses, in high schools, and for churches and conferences, and she regularly appears in interviews and radio/TV/podcasts, including appearances on MSNBC, BBC Newsday, EWTN, Focus on the Family, Relevant Radio, Christianity Today, and Real Presence LIVE. 

Emily is particularly passionate about reaching the youth of the pro-life movement. As a recent college student, she understands what it feels like to walk unprepared into a culture that is overwhelmingly pro-choice. Until she found ERI, she was faced daily with challenges to the pro-life position that she didn’t know how to answer, and she was afraid to speak out. She wants to equip pro-life students with the tools to intimately understand and articulate their pro-life convictions in a productive and compassionate manner. 

“The future of our movement lies with our youth. It is pro-life students who sit in classrooms daily with the very women who are most likely to seek an abortion. It is pro-life students who study philosophy, biology, and social justice in their coursework. It is pro-life students who can foster a culture of dialogue, respect, understanding, and intellectual consistency in academia. I want to empower pro-life students to turn the caricature of the pro-life movement on its head, becoming known as the most loving, respectful, and logical students their campus has ever seen.” 

Emily is also on the Board of Directors for Cradle of Hope, an organization that provides financial and material assistance to families and pregnant women. Cradle of Hope partners with over 180 agencies throughout Minnesota, including 7 of the 11 Minnesota Tribes, to prevent evictions and homelessness while giving families education and resources that empower them to choose life and care for their young children.

Emily graduated summa cum laude from St. Olaf College in 2021 with a B.M. in Vocal Music Education.

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Now What? Abortion Dialogue After a Trump Victory

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Election night. After weeks of hearing from almost every major pollster that this election would be unprecedently close and maybe wouldn’t be called for days, it just…wasn’t. It wasn’t close at all. Harris supporters are reeling, and it’s probably no surprise to you that college campuses are a rough place to be right now. That’s why we turned to our ERI Affiliate Groups—local pro-life clubs, many on college campuses—to brainstorm: how should we pro-lifers be handling conversations with pro-choice people in the aftermath?

So yes, Rebecca Carlson and Emily Geiger co-wrote this article, but our incredibly thoughtful students deserve to be in the byline too. They’re out there every day, on the front lines engaging directly with thousands of pro-choice people, and this article came out of their experience and ideas.

Photo by The Now Time

Estimated reading time: 19 minutes
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The Pro-Life Message I Wish I’d Heard in High School

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I don’t know about you, but there was a time in my life when I was absolutely terrified to tell anyone that I was pro-life.

Let me back up.

I grew up Catholic, went to K-12 Catholic school, the whole nine-yards. I knew that I was supposed to be pro-life, and I was pro-life, but I had spent maybe five minutes of my entire life thinking deeply about abortion. So when I went off to college, I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into.

I went to St. Olaf College, where in the fall of 2016, the students staged a massive protest against our local pro-life pregnancy center. The pregnancy center was hosting their annual fundraising banquet in the ballrooms of our student union, and when the students found out, they lined the hallways waving signs, trying to stop community members from entering and raising money to provide free resources to pregnant and parenting families.

Yeah, it took me about two seconds to realize that publicly identifying as pro-life was social suicide.

Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
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I’m pregnant: The hot takes and musings of a pregnant pro-life advocate

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I’m pregnant.

Thank you for all the well wishes; my husband and I are indeed thrilled to be awaiting the birth of Baby Geiger in August. (In case you missed the byline, this is your favorite ERI gal Emily Geiger, formerly Emily Albrecht. I got married last November!)

Anyways, I’m thrilled about my pregnancy.

But what if I wasn’t thrilled?

In the days after two little pink lines on a stick announced that there is a tiny human growing inside my body, I couldn’t help but imagine what life would be like if I wasn’t pro-life; if I didn’t know what I do about pregnancy and abortion; if my life circumstances were different and more challenging.

Estimated reading time: 13 minutes
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Compassion works. Bullhorns don’t.

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As an officer of Titans for Life at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (one of our wonderful Affiliate Groups across the country), Sally Windler knows ERI apologetics forward, backward, and inside out. Recently, on the way out of a pro-choice panel discussion on her college campus, Sally stumbled upon an all-too-common scene: two men with cameras strapped to their bodies, holding a giant image of a bloody, dismembered baby doll. A camera on a tripod nearby recorded the small crowd that had formed around the pair as they screamed Bible verses at the appalled students.

Unfortunately, this scene is all too familiar to the pro-life advocates we train. In fact, one of the most common questions we receive from sidewalk counselors is how to handle “abolitionist” activists who act like this (or worse). It is often the case that no matter what the more gracious pro-lifer says;, the abolitionist will often get argumentative or just refuse to talk to the advocate at all, making progress nearly impossible.

Yet, after only one conversation with Sally, these two abortion abolitionists abandoned their bullhorns and walked away!

So, how did she do it?

Estimated reading time: 8 minutes
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Abortion and Medical Necessity: Press Talking Points

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Microphone in forefront and blurred people in background

Talking about abortion with pro-choice people can already feel scary. Multiply that by a million, and that’s how it feels for most of us to talk to pro-choice press! We have so much empathy for pro-life people who’ve been caught flat-footed in interviews, especially in this post-Roe era when tensions are high and questions about legislation are complicated. We’ve been there too! One particular way many pro-life people have been causing unforced errors resulting in bad publicity is by using definitions of “abortion” that don’t line up with the mainstream understanding. Once you understand the nuance of abortion definitions and medical procedures to save a woman’s life, here’s how we recommend responding to questions on abortion and life of the mother in shortened, press interview-like situations. These answers are authored by Emily and written in her voice.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes