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Abortion Makes Mother's Day a Solemn Occasion for Many Women
Life News ^ | 5/5/08 | Maria Vitale

Posted on 05/05/2008 4:22:34 PM PDT by wagglebee

LifeNews.com Note: Maria Vitale is a LifeNews.com Opinion Columnist and the Education Director of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation. Vitale has written and reported for various broadcast and print media outlets, including National Public Radio, CBS Radio, and AP Radio.


Mother's Day will be bittersweet in some segments of our nation this year.

For some women, there will be no flowers, no chocolates—just the painful memory of a child lost forever to abortion.

It may seem incongruous to talk about abortion in connection with Mother's Day. After all, this is a holiday meant to celebrate the amazing, life-affirming gift of motherhood. Yet, in our schizophrenic society, it's possible that some women will go in to facilities to have abortions on Saturday and be expected to join in the celebrations of Mother's Day on Sunday.

I've seen the anguished face of a woman reliving the moment of her abortion. It's a portrait of pain that is indescribable in its torment. At times like that, there will be no abortion facility personnel around to hold the woman's hand, to treat her post-traumatic stress disorder, to bring her healing and hope.

And abortion is certainly not a rare occurrence in our nation. An estimated 1.2 million abortions occur each year in the U.S. Since 1973, the year that Roe versus Wade was decided, an estimated 50 million unborn children have died as a result of legal abortion.

Abortion has become a major public health problem, in terms of its effects on the health of women. Study after study shows the devastating impact that abortion can have on the physical and psychological well-being of America's female citizens. For instance, one study shows that one in five women who have had abortions will suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder—the illness most commonly linked with soldiers returning from the battlefront. Research has also shown that post-abortive women are likely to have worse health overall than other women.

As many as 60 percent of women who have had abortions think about suicide. Abortion has been linked with a two-fold increased risk of alcohol abuse, and women who abort are twice as likely to become heavy smokers. Yet, when was the last time you saw a local news segment focused on the harmful health effects of abortion? Have you ever?

Part of the problem is the disinformation campaign waged by the abortion industry. To hear abortion providers tell it, you would think that there are no side-effects from abortion at all. Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion operation, claims abortion is safe but available medical research contradicts such a contention.

The wall of silence surrounding abortion can cause a woman to suffer alone. Following an abortion, there is no wake, no funeral, no graveside service. Women are expected to tough it out in isolation, with no one around to join them in their mourning. The grieving process is heightened by the fact that this was a death which could have been prevented.

The pro-life movement is reaching out to women who regret their abortions. Retreat programs such as Rachel's Vineyard help post-abortive women to cope with their losses. Women can visit www.rachelsvineyard.org and be put in touch with someone who can share their pain. Women can reclaim their motherhood, naming the babies lost to abortion. They can find consolation in the forgiveness of an all-loving God.

This Mother's Day, please remember those mothers who never got to see their children's faces…those who were coerced into abortion…and those who chose abortion based on misunderstandings and misinformation. Their losses are deep, and their emotional scars can last a lifetime.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abortion; moralabsolutes; mothersday; postabortivewomen; prolife
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To: mamelukesabre
Suicide is unforgiveable. Cold blooded pre meditated murder is unforgiveable. These are basic fundamental christian concepts. Everything else is forgiveable. But those two big ones are automatic eternal damnation. I’m pretty sure I’m not mistaken on this. Sorry I don’t have a link. Someone else on this thread maybe can set me straight or back me up with some kind of proof

I believe you are mistaken. The Bible is full of stories of people who murdered others, including King David. Yet he was one of God's favorites.

Even on the cross, Jesus asked God to forgive his murderers. I don't think he would have asked if it were impossible.

Others have mentioned Paul's role in the murder of Stephen and others.

I'm not familiar with any scripture that says or even implies that murder is unforgivable. If one repents and is born again, he is born again with his sins forgiven. Certain denominations may teach different things, but I think the scriptural basis for such a pronouncement is at best shakey.

21 posted on 05/05/2008 7:08:32 PM PDT by TN4Liberty (Election 2008 - American Idol except no one can sing.)
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To: wagglebee

Wasn’t it the gay rights people last year that wanted to eliminate Mother’s Day? They claimed it was unfair to lesbian couples or some BS like that.


22 posted on 05/05/2008 7:11:24 PM PDT by mtg
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To: TN4Liberty

Killing and murder are not the same thing. All murders are killings. But not all killings are murders.


23 posted on 05/05/2008 7:15:47 PM PDT by mamelukesabre (Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?)
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To: mamelukesabre; sionnsar

You are quite mistaken in your assertion that murder and suicide are unforgiveable. If God is the final arbitor of what is or is not forgiveable, Jesus Christ plainly states that blaspheming the Holy Spirit is the only unpardonable sin. “And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in his age or in the age to come.”(Matthew 12: 31-32) Christ himself said it. Blaspheming the Holy Spirit happens when the miracles of God are attributed to Satan. Only ignorant and foolish people said that Jesus was casting our demons by Beelzebub (the prince of demons - a.k.a. Satan). His answer to them ought to sober anyone up who pretends to know what can and cannot be forgiven.

Remember also that the Lord’s prayer also says “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The teaching Jesus relates to this prayer is very illustrative. “For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”
(Matthew 6:14-15)


24 posted on 05/05/2008 7:25:45 PM PDT by LibreOuMort (Give me liberty, or give me death! (Patrick Henry))
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To: sionnsar

“Please include miscarriages; those would-be mothers hurt too, sometimes for a lifetime.”

I’m so glad you brought that up! Even though I have four children, I ache for the ones I lost. I will pray for all of these women and for those that wish they could have children but are unable to for whatever reason.


25 posted on 05/05/2008 7:28:13 PM PDT by samiam1972 ("It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish."-Mother Teresa)
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To: LibreOuMort
Is it not true that traditional catholics do not perform a religious ceremony at the funeral of someone that committed suicide? It's because anyone that commits suicide does not go to heaven.(in the eyes of a traditional catholic that is)

I'm not making this stuff up. So you can quit trying to scold me as if I alone am attempting to set a rule you don't like. And pointing out that I'm not qualified to determine anyone's judgment in the here after is hardly proof that I'm wrong about this or that you are right.

26 posted on 05/05/2008 7:56:35 PM PDT by mamelukesabre (Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?)
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To: mamelukesabre

The only thing I know that is unpardonable is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, according to Scripture.


27 posted on 05/05/2008 11:03:09 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (I'd like to tell you, but then I'd have to kill you.)
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To: wagglebee

It is sad that any woman would be sad on Mother’s Day for something she did. Prayers for all who have to live in that state - I know a couple of them myself.


28 posted on 05/05/2008 11:17:06 PM PDT by AFPhys ((.Praying for President Bush, our troops, their families, and all my American neighbors..))
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To: mamelukesabre
Killing and murder are not the same thing. All murders are killings. But not all killings are murders.

True, but not relevant to the point I was making.

29 posted on 05/06/2008 1:34:06 AM PDT by TN4Liberty (Election 2008 - American Idol except no one can sing.)
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To: wagglebee
Pinged from Terri Dailies

8mm


30 posted on 05/06/2008 3:20:25 AM PDT by 8mmMauser (Jezu ufam tobie...Jesus I trust in Thee)
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To: mamelukesabre
Suicide is unforgiveable.

Because the perp is also deceased, and incapable of repenting.

Cold blooded pre meditated murder is unforgiveable.

False. Show me that anywhere in Scripture or Tradition.

31 posted on 05/06/2008 6:01:50 AM PDT by ArrogantBustard (Western Civilization is Aborting, Buggering, and Contracepting itself out of existence.)
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To: mamelukesabre

Who are you to presume to say what is or is not forgiveable. You will answer to God for that - not me. There is still time to repent and I hope and pray you do. Your judgement will be on your own head and that scares me. You still have not answered the WORD of God on this issue. I don’t care what a group of men or women has “determined” to be true. Jesus said “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except by me.” What THE TRUTH has said, that is what I hold to be true. Deal with that. Do not attack me for what Jesus says. Go to Him with your complaint. And while you are at it, let the dead bury the dead.


32 posted on 05/06/2008 10:39:31 AM PDT by LibreOuMort (Give me liberty, or give me death! (Patrick Henry))
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To: mamelukesabre

I think that “traditional” is the key word here - and in Catholic tradition, you would be correct. I am a practicing Catholic and, although I certainly don’t speak for anyone but myself, I prefer to assume that a suicide is an act of mental illness or defect which can severely limit or even eliminate one’s ability to make accountable moral choices. But the Scriptural quotes to the effect that ony “blasphemy of the Holy Spirit” is unforgiveable are, from my reading, accurate. Tradition and Scripture don’t always line up and, when that happens, Scripture is what I go by.


33 posted on 05/06/2008 4:43:59 PM PDT by Emmett McCarthy
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To: Emmett McCarthy

“The God I serve is a forgiving God. The men who killed President John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. can be forgiven. Everyone can come to the mercy seat and find forgiveness and acceptance. But, and this may be the essence of my argument, suppose one is so hard-hearted and so in-different to life until he assumes that there is nothing for which to be forgiven. What happens to the mind of a person, and the moral fabric of a nation, that accepts the aborting of the life of a baby without a pang of conscience? What kind of a person, and what kind of a society will we have 20 years hence if life can be taken so casually? It is that question, the question of our attitude, our value system, and our mind-set with regard to the nature and worth of life itself that is the central question confronting mankind. Failure to answer that question affirmatively may leave us with a hell right here on earth.”


34 posted on 05/24/2008 8:16:48 AM PDT by karatekid60
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To: karatekid60

I share your concerns for the larger picture and the broader attitudes of society as a whole. Yet, I am only one person and only responsible for my own attitudes. In a sense, I’ve found it necessary for me to step back from the argument and debate. It’s mostly a question of what is both most useful to others as well as most healthy for me. Learning to “live in the light” and speak the words as whatever situation might might arise and, most important, trusting God to lead in all of it. After 20 years away from it, my life is moving back to songwriting and maybe that’s where I’m best suited to carry whatever message I’m entrusted with. It’s all very “developmentally in process” and none of it is really clear to me just yet. I do know that the stresses of debating or even listening to the various talk show hosts finally grew to a point that it was damaging to me personally and spiritually - not to mention that it was about as useful as trying to teach my dog to read. One of my first of my new and growing catalogue of songs is called “A Dream A Lot Like Mine” which is a little different approach to this topic. If you click on http://www.myspace.com/emmettgrayson, that is the first one which will come up. It’s my effort towards “winning hearts and minds” in my own little way.


35 posted on 05/24/2008 10:27:47 AM PDT by Emmett McCarthy
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To: Emmett McCarthy

I think that your dream of songwriting is really admirable, and if that is your way of carrying messages to people around you, then keep at it! I am only 12 years old, but I really appreciate your music!


36 posted on 05/24/2008 12:54:30 PM PDT by karatekid60
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To: karatekid60

Thank you. The fact that you’re only 12 and yet showing such great thoughtfulness about all these various subjects, especially abortion, is both a new hope for people of new generation as well as a credit to both yourself and those who are raising you. I applaud all concerned.

Now, also about only being 12 and appreciating my music - that is far more important than you might realize. I’m 58 and am in the unusually fortunate position of having my teenage children genuinely like my songs. It’s not just a joy to the “old man”, which is actually what’s important to me, but it’s also a good indicator of how successful a song might be in the marketplace. So, because of your young age, your opinion is more important than you might think. Thank you again for your kind words.


37 posted on 05/24/2008 1:29:58 PM PDT by Emmett McCarthy
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To: Emmett McCarthy

Your welcome! :)


38 posted on 05/24/2008 6:03:03 PM PDT by karatekid60
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