When I was in my twenties, I thought abortion was an acceptable form of birth control. I fell for the lie that the human within a mother’s womb was merely a clump of cells. When a friend asked me to drive her to an abortion clinic, I agreed. I drove her to a clinic in South Florida and waited in my car while the “procedure” was performed. When she limped out of the clinic after the abortion with an overwhelming sense of sadness, I watched her and said nothing. I said nothing. I regret that immensely. Had I only realized the way killing our own children in the womb can cause such pain, I would have spoken up prior to the killing.
Russia was the first country to legalize abortion in 1920. Abortions under communistic regimes are widespread, forced, and horrific. China’s “one child” policy resulted in the abortions of millions of souls.
Numerous countries followed Russia’s murderous lead, including the United States in 1973. Millions of mothers have decided to “terminate the pregnancies” of their unborn children ever since. Millions of mothers have believed in the lie – that the baby was merely a “clump of cells,” a “terminated pregnancy,” and/or a body that felt no pain. They believed killing their own child is a “reproductive right.”
These are all lies. These are all euphemisms, propagated by abortion mills such as Planned Parenthood and sick governments. They break my heart.
By the time I was 30 years old, I had decided that I would never kill (abort) my own child. The experience with my friend caused me to reflect on the way we should never do that. I married my husband a few years later in 2003 and became pregnant with our first child soon afterwards. But our little baby had a very weak heartbeat and we lost him/her. Many years later, we learned we should name our miscarried children, so we decided to name our miscarried baby. We prayed and decided that if our baby is our son, his name is John. And if she is our daughter, her name is Mary. We named our baby after John the Baptist and John the apostle or Mary, the Mother of God, and Mary Magdelene. We look forward to meeting our child in heaven. Our two sons, Jack and Sean, are also named after the apostle John. We named my oldest son after my uncle Jack, John Wheeler, and we named our youngest with the Irish version of the name John.
Flashing back to the early days after my marriage to Keith, I had been worrying about being too old to give birth to a healthy baby. Many days of pain followed that miscarriage. But we were soon blessed with our first son in December of 2004. In 2005, God again blessed us with our second son. But that pregnancy did not come without a trial. While undergoing a 2nd trimester ultrasound, the clinician told us our son had two soft markers for Down Syndrome: echogenic heart and echogenic bowels. Then she said we need not worry. If the amniocentesis came back positive for Down Syndrome, we could simply “terminate the pregnancy.”
Those words sent chills up my spine. How could the clinician refer to my son, whom we had named, a “pregnancy” that we could simply choose to “terminate?” Who gave us those rights? I could see his cute little face, fingers, and toes, and was told I could simply wipe him from existence due to these perceived imperfections. I spent the next handful of days searching the internet to learn about what it would be like to be a mom of a child with Down Syndrome. I learned that children with Down Syndrome are incredibly loving and can be a tremendous blessing to parents. My husband and I decided that no matter the results of the amniocentesis, we would give birth to our son, the amazing person with whom God had blessed us. It turned out that the “soft markers” were not significant and Sean was born without Down Syndrome.
I now work in a university as a professor of business management and associate dean. Pregnant women are exceedingly rare among our student population – and probably all university student populations in Western or communistic countries. Why? In the United States, Planned Parenthood and other abortion mills have facilities everywhere. They often appear on our campus to sell their lies, deceptions, and euphemisms.
Saint Teresa of Calcutta observed that we will never find peace while the world is still killing our children. Women who abort their children often do so to benefit their own “prosperity.” What we are doing today goes back to ancient times. People sacrificed their children to their gods in ancient times by burning their babies for better crops in places such as Carthage and Canaan. The Aztecs burned their babies at an altar to their prosperity gods. We are sacrificing our babies to our own gods of prosperity – sacrificing our children for a better career, more money, and an easier life.
But when God blesses us with a child, our response should be complete gratitude. The miracle of life and the blessings children can bring us are immense. Babies are a blessing from God. They are God’s way of showing us that he wants us to “go forth and multiply.” He is blessing us with that incredible opportunity to bring life to this earth.
If you know of someone who is considering an abortion, please do not do what I did by driving her to an abortion mill. Please share my story – or yours – or someone else’s. Jesus WANTS to forgive us when we trespass against him. Ask him for forgiveness, if you feel the need to do so. Please tell them about the many pregnancy resource centers in your area. In the United States, CareNet offers help for women. If you have had an abortion and regret it, please speak out. Your stories can make an immense difference for others. God has pre-planned our missions and yours may be to share your story to prevent other women from drinking the modern-day kool-aid. May God bless you.
Thank you for your time. SJ Thomason is a wife, mother of two sons, and university professor and administrator. Most importantly, she is a Christian who believes that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.
Christian Apologist 