It is with great sorrow that the executive of Right to Life joins with the pro-life movement in New Zealand to mourn the passing of Nina Barry- Martin.
Nina was one of the founders of Pregnancy Counselling Services in New Zealand. Nina founded Pregnancy Counselling Services after becoming disillusioned with Youth Lines nondirective counselling and Pregnancy Help, which focused on helping women facing an unplanned pregnancy by supporting women in the decision that they made, which included abortion. Nina commendably was dedicated to saving babies and women from the violence of abortion. Nina said, “because we save two people with every pregnancy: mother and baby.”
Nina launched her new service by placing one advertisement in a newspaper, which was all she could afford. This advert was instrumental in saving the life of a baby and a mother from a lifetime of grief and sorrow. The child saved went on to become a PCS counsellor, to become a lawyer and to marry and have five children. There will be many other people who are alive today because of the loving support and counselling provided by Nina and her colleagues.
Nina, with her friends and supporters, expanded the counselling service to cover 24 hours a day, for seven days a week, with a trained counsellor always available to offer compassionate help to distressed pregnant women . PCS at its peak had 23 branches.
Nina’s love for women and their precious unborn was not confined to New Zealand. Nina was invited to present an address to a pro-life conference at the Vatican. Nina also went to Hong Kong, India and the Philippines to help establish a pregnancy and post abortion service.
Nina was born in Palmerston North in 1926, the only child of Lebanese parents Marie and Basil Coury. Nina had a beautiful voice and after winning a singing competition on the Manawatu radio at the age of 12 went on to sing on national radio to present a programme about her favourite composer, Johann Strauss.
Nina served on the board of PCS for 40 years and retired in 2011. Nina enjoyed the loving lifelong support of her husband Peter who shared her passionate love for mothers distressed with their pregnancy and for their precious unborn. Peter was a distinguished past national President of the National Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child.
Right to Life was privileged to have Nina as a patron. Those of us who were privileged to know Nina were greatly encouraged by her love, dedication, passion and commitment to the wellbeing of mothers and the unborn.
We can contemplate with awe the grand reception from choirs of aborted unborn children that awaited Nina after a lifetime of service to women and the unborn as she commenced her eternal life.
Ken Orr
On behald of Right to Life Executive
It is a tragedy that seven grieving women killed themselves within forty-two days of having an abortion in New Zealand between 2006 and 2016.