Culture Challenge of the Week: Mother’s Day after Abortion

Mother’s Day is a wonderful celebration- a time when mothers are honored for their constant love and daily sacrifice, and when life itself is recognized and treasured as the gift that it is.

But for many women who have had abortions, Mother’s Day is one of the biggest triggers of painful memories, regrets, and remorse over what “might have been.”

Even though they accepted and believed the messages our society esteems so highly—messages about a woman’s right to choose and the importance of “family planning”—these women have learned, through bitter experience, the truth that abortion is tragic for women.

Though they are free from the responsibility of raising a child, free from the embarrassment of pregnancy, free from financial burden and free to control their own lives, their broken hearts are imprisoned by a sense of great loss, shame and regret.

The even sadder truth is that many Christians, the very people who should show the most compassion to these hurting women, pour their judgment out upon them instead. And when Christians preach judgment rather than forgiveness, they hinder the healing process of not only those women, but the entire nation.

In honor of all those who desperately want to experience the joy of Mother’s Day, but cannot undo the decisions of their past, I share this truth:

King David, the great psalmist, recorded his own experience with regret in a poem to the Lord. In Psalm 32, we find where he wrote,

“When I refused to confess my sin, my body wasted away, and I groaned all day long… Finally, I confessed all my sins to you and stopped trying to hide my guilt… And you forgave me! All my guilt is gone. Therefore, let all the godly pray to you while there is still time, that they may not drown in the floodwaters of judgment. For you are my hiding place; you protect me from trouble. You surround me with songs of victory.”

“I prayed to the Lord, and he answered me. He freed me from all my fears. Those who look to him for help will be radiant with joy; no shadow of shame will darken their faces. In my desperation I prayed, and the Lord listened; he saved me from all my troubles.”

The world offers us “control” of our lives. But the Lord offers us freedom from the need to control our lives.

If you find yourself suffocating in regret, turn to Jesus. Allow his forgiveness to pour over you so you can find the strength to forgive yourself. And know you are not alone in your pain and you don’t have to be alone in your healing.

There are so many resources - so many people who want to help you move your heart and soul in the right direction. (If you are interested in that kind of help, one great resource is Project Rachel. Visit hopeafterabortion.org for more information.)

If you are pro-life, and especially if you are a Christian, search your heart for any remnant of judgment or condemnation toward others and lay it at the foot of the cross. The compassion of Christ working through us is the only thing that can bring true healing to the hearts of others and true restoration to our country.

Abortion is our nation’s worst, most destructive injustice. And as it destroys the lives of the most innocent, it’s important to remember that its affects continue on to damage the physical, psychological and spiritual health of women (and men), making our great country weaker on all fronts. Abortion’s affects are evils that must be healed by aggressive forgiveness and compassion.

Abortion itself, on the other hand, is an evil that must be battled in our culture. Policies and laws will not effectively or permanently change unless public opinion changes first. What our nation needs is for people to aggressively share the truth about the damage abortion does.

If you have a story about how abortion has hurt you or your family, share it. Don’t hide the pain any longer- let it be known.

One of the most powerful stories that portrays many of the horrors associated with abortion is the story of Dr. Kermit Gosnell. Though it isn’t your “typical” abortion story—it is perhaps one of the most telling in history of what often happens inside the womb, just out of sight. Dr. Gosnell was convicted of gruesomely murdering babies he had just delivered at his abortion clinic. It is thought that in his 30 years of practice, he killed thousands of newborn (late term) babies - often by using scissors to snip the spinal chords of these little ones as they struggled to live.

Gosnell is now serving several life sentences for his crimes, but his story never attracted much attention from the media. What Gosnell's trial revealed is the truth: abortion is a gruesome act that kills innocent children and scars their mothers for life. And that truth hits too close to home for Hollywood and the mainstream news media who champion the "choice" that is abortion.

Thankfully, there are some brave souls willing to tell the hard stories that reveal the truth. A group of three filmmakers and journalists - Phelim McAleer, Ann McElhinney and Magdalena Segieda - are in the final days of a crowd-funding campaign to raise the funds needed to make a movie about Dr. Gosnell, the biggest serial killer in American history. At www.GosnellMovie.com, you can help tell the story.

If they haven’t reached their fundraising goal by noon on May 12, all the money already raised will be returned and the movie will never go into production. You can give as little as one dollar to help tell the story that the media refuses to.

Please help tell this story so that the babies who lost their lives will not be forgotten; so that America will face the ugly truth about abortion and begin her journey to a better place; and so that the lies about the "freedom" of abortion may one day cease to rob women of the joy that can be theirs every Mother's Day.

Most importantly, help tell this story so that you might achieve the greatest victory of all: saving other babies from becoming victims. Psalm 24:11 admonishes: "Rescue those unjustly sentenced to death...." Thank you for doing what you can to rescue the most innocent among us.

In some ways you may be right about that, but I have found that as these women age they do think about their babies from time to time. Here’s the story of one woman:

Recently she had been browsing Facebook. Putting in names of old friends and a few old boyfriends too. She wondered whatever happened to the boy who got her pregnant, the father of her aborted baby. Here’s what she learned:

He went on to marry a beautiful wife and they live in a very fine home in an upscale area. They attend Church regularly and both kids attended in college. The oldest, the boy, was happily posting about his missionary assignment after college. Shockingly his assignment was right in her hometown.

As the woman has returned to God and Church, she could not help but marvel at what she was reading. She had come from a very dysfunctional family and the abortion was done to stop the family line. A genetic line that at the time(17 years old) she did not want continued, nor did she feel she would have the ability to deal with a son, a son that turned out like her evil brothers.

Her brothers though sowed some ‘wild seed,’ and neither lived to see their adult children. One died in a motorcycle accident and the other was shot by police. BUT...the one known child grew up to be fine young man, served in the Marines for 10 years and eventually will have a degree in Engineering...as well as a beautiful wife & two great kids.

Yes Cowgirl, she was such a selfish young girl at one time.

I am meeting with her early Sunday morning and we’re going to pray together over her guilt and grief.

I cannot even fathom the pain this woman feels today as life clearly now shows her ...what could have been.

For some women it is very selfish reasons what they did, but this gal has truly had significant pains nearly all her life...and to now realize she may have missed out on some of life’s greatest joys?

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