…abortion is something we tend to be more comfortable discussing as an abstraction; the feelings it provokes are too complicated to face in all their particularities. Which is perhaps why, even in doggedly liberal parts of the country, very few people talk openly about the experience, leaving the reality of abortion, and the emotions that accompany it, a silent witness in our political discourse. Even now, four decades after Roe, some of the women we spoke with would talk only if we didn’t print their real names.
As their stories show, the experience of abortion in the United States in 2013 is vastly uneven. It varies not just by state but also by culture, race, income, age, family; by whether a boyfriend offered a ride to the clinic or begged her not to go; by the compassion or callousness of the medical staff; by whether she took the pill alone at home or navigated protesters outside a clinic. Some feel so shamed that they will never tell their friends or family; others feel stronger for having gotten through the experience. The same woman can wake up one morning with regret, the next with relief””most have feelings too knotty for a picket sign. “There’s no room,” one woman told us, “to talk about being unsure.”
Read it all. I offer readers a caution here–do not delve into this unless you are in the proper mode, so to speak–KSH.
This important article raises some crucial issues that have been neglected for far too long. The fact that abortions are extremely common, within the Church as well as within the wider secularized society, means that we Christians have a HUGE pastoral problem to deal with as there are MILLIONS of sincere, dedicated Christians (as well as many partially converted ones) who have undergone abortions. And especially in conservative Christian circles, most of them are extremely reluctant to admit it to anyone and thus are left to deal with their unresolved grief, pain, and guilt or even shame on their own.
I recently had a remarkable experience that drove that problem home to me as never before. This fall I took the training in healing prayer ministry offered by Francis and Judith MacNutt, the Level II training course in fact, offered by Christian Healing Ministry in Jacksonville. The 13th and last session of that course involves training people in praying for those who suffer deep wounds from having had an abortion (including men, suffering from having encouraged a wife, girlfriend, or daughter, etc. to have an abortion, or as the father of the aborted child). The small group of people that I was taking the class with included four women. All are zealous Christians. And three of the four had had abortions when they were in their early 20s, before their conversions. One of the three broke down into tears, sobs really, as she confessed that she had never told a single person about what she had done, and the pain and shame had haunted her relentlessly for many yealrs. It was a deeply moving time, as for perhaps 20-30 minutes the rest of us in the group prayed with her and watched and listened as she poured her heart out, finally giving vent to all the unbearable grief and guilt that she’d carried for so long. What an eye opening experience. I’ll never be the same.
For those unfamiliar with the marvelous ministry called [b]Anglicans For Life[/b], headed up by the immensely gifted and dedicated Georgette Forney, who herself had an abortion when she was young and ignorant, there is a tremendous program called “Silent No More.” Silent No More encourages women to share their stories in a safe, healing environment and receive the healing they need. Some of them can later share their testimony out in the public square.
There are millions of hurting women (and men) out there that the Church isn’t helping. And a lot of them are in the pews every Sunday. We have so much to learn about how to minister God’s grace and healing to them, and how to help them find freedom in Christ.
David Handy+
David:
What is “partially converted”?
[blockquote] There are millions of hurting women (and men) out there that the Church isn’t helping. And a lot of them are in the pews every Sunday. We have so much to learn about how to minister God’s grace and healing to them, and how to help them find freedom in Christ. [/blockquote]
Well said, Father.
How do we know that 1 in 3 statistic is the truth? I know the NY Times would never lie for political reasons but I’d like some better data.
I don’t think I can bring myself to read the article. I would just add another area of pain is men whose wives or girlfriends have aborted their children without their knowledge or consent. The father has no legal power to stop such a thing. It is every bit as painful.