OTTAWA (LifeSiteNews) – A new Canadian “Christian Health Centre” that promotes traditional Christian bioethics and the sanctity of life from “birth to death” has seen huge interest from the local pro-life community, which is rallying to make its upcoming fundraiser a great success.
The Ottawa Christian Health Centre (OCHC), once opened, looks to be a “leader in creating opportunities to infuse Christian values into healthcare services for the benefit of both patients and providers.”
Dr. Andrew Mai, physician and director of the OCHC, spoke with LifeSiteNews and confirmed that Ottawa Archbishop Marcel Damphousse is attending its upcoming gala, noting, “He is very supportive.”
“That’s excellent news,” he told LifeSiteNews.
Mai said that to date, some 220 tickets have already been sold, and that since the OCHC was launched in February 2025 with a similar fundraiser, interest has increased, but it is still in the “early days.”
“We’re very, very early, we don’t have money, any infrastructure of any kind,” he told LifeSiteNews.
“We have the support of Fr. Mark Goring, meeting at his church at St. Mary’s … It is an ecumenical initiative, one of our board members is an evangelical Christian.”
The OCHC Dinner Dance & Gala Fundraiser will be taking place on January 16 at Sala San Marco, in Ottawa, Ontario, from 6 to 11 p.m. Tickets are $125 per person and can be purchased by emailing [email protected] or via their website, with a purchase deadline of January 14.
The centre is still in need of support from the pro-life community to not only buy tickets to the upcoming gala but also help it afterward. The centre’s partners are Campaign Life Coalition and Life Matters.
Centre aims to offer total ‘pro-life’ health care
Mai told LifeSiteNews that the OCHC will focus on being a primary pro-life Health Care Centre due to Canada’s ever-present euthanasia laws.
He said he believes Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) will soon be expanded to both minors and those with mental illness. Because of this, the time to act is now, he said, so that Canadians can have healthcare alternatives.
There will be an assisted living component that Mai said will offer “faith and life-affirming care and not be streamlined to accept physician-assisted killing.”
There will also be a hospice aspect, as Mai noted how he has seen a hospice he was once heavily involved with “change” to the point it now that “people to be euthanized on site.”
Mai also told LifeSiteNews that there will be full support for pregnant women, “who otherwise might abort their babies,” so that they can choose life.
The Liberal government under Prime Minister Mark Carney has worked to expand euthanasia 13-fold since it was legalized in 2016. Canada now has the fastest-growing assisted suicide program in the world. Meanwhile, Health Canada has released a series of studies on advanced requests for assisted suicide.
Additionally, the Liberal government has been very much pro-abortion and has toyed with the idea of stripping Canadian pro-life charities and churches of their charity tax status.
Health Centre will ‘uphold the dignity of life from conception to natural death’
The centre’s Mission Statement reads that it looks to create opportunities for and give “support to health care organizations in the Ottawa area that provide care based on Christian principles which promote physical, spiritual and emotional wellbeing, and that are aligned with the Hippocratic oath.”
One of these main values is to “Uphold the dignity of life from conception to natural death,” as well as promote a “holistic approach to health that is wellness focused.”
The OCHC also looks to promote patient “centred collaborative care” along with “patient autonomy and informed consent.”
When looked at deeper, the OCHC is a Christian community that is committed to “supporting traditional Christian bioethics, with particular emphasis on the sanctity of all human life, from conception to natural death.”
“We affirm love, compassion, and dignity as guiding values in our mission and work. All members and directors of OCHC affirm the following Statement of Faith, which provides the theological foundation of our organization,” the organization says.
The OCHC promotes a total Christian-focused approach to health care, which is one of the first in Canada, stating that human life is a “sacred gift from God, and its value is not determined by age, ability, or circumstance. From fertilization onward, each individual is known and cherished by God.”
“We affirm the sanctity of life at every stage and seek to uphold the dignity of every person, including the unborn, the vulnerable, the needy, and the elderly,” the centre says.
With state-sanctioned euthanasia on the rise in Canada, the OCHC also heavily promotes “life until its ‘natural end,’” in the “caring for and defending those who are vulnerable, and rejecting all forms of violence, abuse, neglect, or practices that diminish and harm a human life.”
