How Does a Christian Stay-Home Mom Respond to Planned Parenthood?

I’ve been thinking a lot about the Planned Parenthood sting video that’s been all over the internet.

It’s awful. And sad and horrifying and gut-turning. And every response I’ve seen has been appropriately revolted. Of course, I have limited circles, so maybe there are people out there (besides PP) saying that it’s just fine and no big deal and actually quite lovely. If there are, they are staying comparatively quiet.

As a stay-home mom, what can I do to play a part in stopping this great evil? It’s easy to feel insignificant. When I first saw the video, I kept thinking–we’ve got to DO something. We’ve got to get this out there; people must know! Surely someone, somewhere, can order this stopped! And then I saw this. And I remembered that we already do know. Everyone knows.

The difference is simply, does the dead baby’s body get dropped, bloody, into a garbage bag or some other container, and taken out to the trash to slowly decompose without a name or a grave or a stuffed animal or a blanket OR does he or she get “harvested”, pulled apart and shipped to whatever lab deals in this kind of deathly desecration.

We moms know what it’s like to see our baby on ultrasound for the first time. We know the utter astonishment and miracle of seeing another person’s heart beating inside your womb. We know the amazement that such a thing is possible and the profound sense of otherness that that little person has from us. They are not us. They are not our body. They are unique and they have a God-given right to a protected residence inside of us for nine months.

These are old arguments. The same simple truths we’ve been saying for years. But part of what we can do is keep saying them. The fight for the unborn is not something we can get on a bandwagon for when popular opinion isn’t too opposed to it. It’s something we say, even when it’s an old story. It’s something we say when the chips of public opinion are down and when they’re not. And if we’re faithful, it’s something we’ve been saying when the babies were taken out to the trash, like they have been for the past decades, and now, when the world wakes up to be astonished that they’re also being taken apart and harvested for the damning benefit of others. Can you really say that one is worse than the other? Are our consciences only pricked when shocked with some new evil?

So, I’ll tell you my resolves in regard to this battle for the dead and dying, and ask for you to consider how God might stir you respond.

-I shared the video of PP’s horror and will continue to expose the evil when given an opportunity. I let myself be re-ignited in my horror and resolve.

-I resolve to be unafraid to say that babies are being murdered by their doctors and their mothers and their fathers, no matter who it offends. And to offer the forgiveness of the cross freely, just as it was offered to me.

-I resolve to continue supporting local crisis pregnancy centers.

-I resolve to be willing to engage in relationships and conversations with people who agree and disagree with me and to ask God to help me be persuasive, loving and fearless.

-I resolve to fear God and remember that, in the end, I will give an account, and that cowards have no business in God’s kingdom.

-I resolve to fight back the darkness by loving the children God has given me and not using them; to remember that although they are not in my womb, they are still dependent in many ways and will require more and more of my sacrifices for their good, not less, as time goes on.

-I resolve, in as much as God gives us this grace, to be a family that points to a deeper reality of family–that is, God’s family. To love each other well and remember that God puts children in families, with a mother and father, because it tells them something about Him. And God makes men and women into moms and dads, because it tells them something about Him. And that when a family lacks a dad or a mom, it is still saying something profound about God–that he cares, that he’s there, and that he can make all grace abound to them because He Himself is willing to be their Father because of his Son’s death on the cross.

-I resolve to meditate and act on the Scriptures and to pray for sleepers, who are more dead than the babies they kill, to awake.

“Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not become partners with them; for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says,

“Awake, O sleeper,
and arise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.”

Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.” (Ephesians 5:6-17 ESV)

Let’s resolve to push back the darkness, moms, and let’s start at home.

"..abortion has done what the Klan only dreamed of." -Dr. Alveda King

CNS News reports that, “Abortion kills more black Americans than the seven leading causes of death combined, according to data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for 2005, the latest year for which the abortion numbers are available.”

And so, the spirit of Margaret Sanger lives on in Planned Parenthood.

Sanger, an ardent eugenicist and founder of Planned Parenthood, spoke and wrote of her desire to get rid of such “undesirable” groups as “Negroes” through the method of sterilization and widespread birth control.  At one point in her sordid career she even addressed the women’s auxillary of the Ku Klux Klan.

Dr. Alveda King, niece of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, and pro-life advocate, couldn’t be more right when she points out that “abortion has done what the Klan only dreamed of.”

Those arguing for abortion often demand that it’s African Americans who would suffer the most by being denied the “right” to abortion.

Really?

I can and will never consider the decimation of a race of people to be a “right.”  Nor will I ever consider babies as punishment.

And I hope the reality of the number of African Americans dying each day (1,784) by abortion will jerk some pro-choicers out of their politically correct stupor and help them to realize there is nothing politically correct or civilized about genocide.

perinatal hospice: a grief conserved

My dad just had another article published in World Magazine.

It’s called, A Grief Conserved, and I recommend it.

Here’s how it begins:

“Something’s wrong with this baby,” my ultrasound technician told me. She had just scanned Mrs. Jones (a fictitious name) at 20 weeks and went on to describe her findings, findings that surely meant little chance of survival for that baby. As I later spoke with Mrs. Jones to relay the findings, she wept. I arranged an appointment with a maternal-fetal medicine (MFM) specialist.

The next day I received an urgent call from my patient. Through more tears, she described her visit in which the MFM doctor confirmed the grim prognosis. The baby would die, probably within a week or two. The MFM insisted on scheduling her for an abortion in three days. “Do I have to have an abortion?” she asked. I promised to call the MFM and assured her she did not have to abort.

The reality of unborn babies with fatal genetic abnormalities often goes un-talked about.  At least it seems that way to me.  I think it’s worth considering, especially for those of us who have had no reason to consider it: how we would handle a baby in utero that will almost inevitably die prior to birth?

The article continues:

“But what happens when a routine 20-week ultrasound shows a baby with a profound abnormality, possibly an abnormality that will certainly result in the death of the baby prior to or shortly after birth? Or when a genetic test is done and shows similar results and the patient then decides against abortion? What then?

Enter perinatal hospice, the brain child of Byron Calhoun, a pro-life maternal-fetal medicine specialist.

Perinatal hospice honors life. The woman carrying the disabled child receives extensive counseling and birth preparation involving the combined efforts of MFM specialists, OB/GYN doctors, neonatologists, anesthesia services, chaplains, pastors, social workers, labor and delivery nurses, and neonatal nurses. She carries the pregnancy to its natural conclusion. She and her husband are allowed to grieve and prepare for the short time God may grant them with their child while their baby lives inside or outside the womb. Such a process obviates the grief caused by elective abortion, killing the child before it could be born.

I think perinatal hospice is something worth knowing about and relaying to your friends.  We cannot know what the Lord may have in store for us.  Take a minute and read the rest of the article.  Here’s the last clip I’ll offer:

“Even those mystified by a patient choosing life have recognized the value of Calhoun’s idea, as perinatal hospice programs now dot the nation. But this mystery is no mystery to us. As Job 1:21 states, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”

abortions drop in MN, 2008, but Planned Parenthood performs record numbers

This is good news!

MCCL reports that, “the Minnesota Department of Health released its annual Abortion Report for 2008, and reported abortions in Minnesota dropped more than six percent. The report shows that there were 12,948 abortions reported in 2008, compared to 13,843 the previous year. The 2008 total is the lowest number on record since 1975. Find more information about the Abortion Report and read our in-depth analysis on MCCL’s Web site.

Or check out our YouTube video message.”

However, there is more to the story.  

“Even though the number of abortions last year was the lowest in 33 years, Planned Parenthoodmanaged to increase its abortions to a record 3,948. Planned Parenthood performed nearly 1,200 more abortions than the next largest provider.

Another problem area the report points out is that taxpayer funded abortions rose from 28.6% to 29.8% of all abortions performed. This is the highest percentage since the Minnesota Supreme Court’s 1995 Doe vs. Gomez decision requiring taxpayer funding of elective abortions.”

If you aren’t aware of the great work done at MCCL, I hope you look at their website.  

Two years ago MCCL started the Positive Alternatives program which is a gov’t funded grant program whose funds go to Pregnancy Care Centers that offer clients life-affirming alternatives to abortion.  Positive Alternatives makes it crystal clear to women that no one can force them to have an abortion, and that there are always better options. 

It’s a strange irony that the gov’t both funds abortions, (through taxpayer dollars, unfortunately) and also provides grants to the centers who counsel for life.  

If you have been inactive for too long in the fight to save the unborn and want to take steps to do what you can for babies, moms, and dads, consider donating to MCCL, they literally save lives!

doctors and their fight against the death culture

I’m a big fan of WORLD magazine.  

I started reading it as a young teenager and have enjoyed and profited from it ever since.  

My dad (who blogs at mdviews) recently got an article published in WORLD, and I couldn’t be more excited about it!  My dad is an OB/GYN doctor and has been in the thick of the abortion issue for decades.  (Don’t worry, he’s not 90, only 56).  His (and my mom’s) stand for life has been very influential for me. 

He served on the board of Birthright, a Crisis Pregnancy Center, for many years.  And he’s never been ashamed of his pro-life views.  Quite the opposite.  He counsels women toward life.  

His article in WORLD is about the ever-increasing legal pressure being put on doctors to perform or refer for abortion and to provide euthanasia.  This is not new.  Although the pressure is mounting.

What is new to all of us non-doctors out here (and to be sure many doctors as well), is the formation of a band of physicians who agree to the Hippocratic Oath.  You may not know this, but doctors no longer take the Hippocratic Oath and they haven’t for quite some time.  

This new Registry of Hippocratic Doctors allows for doctors to differentiate themselves from the doctors of death (that is, unfortunately, many of them) and commit to protecting life in every circumstance.

Wouldn’t it be nice, as a patient, to know if your doctor embraced life as a virtue?  Wouldn’t you want to know beforehand that they were committed in everything to do no harm?  My dad outlines some of the key parts of the Hippocratic Oath that you’ll be very interested in. 

Go read it.  It’s definitely worth it.

what should a pro-life Christian think about abortionist George Tiller's murder?

It’s a sad story.

Late-term abortionist George Tiller was gunned down and killed at his church on Sunday.

It shouldn’t have happened.

But what’s a Christian to think about such an event?  We fight for saving the lives of those George Tiller killed: the unborn.  Now he will kill them no more.  How should we be feeling?  Should we put that all aside and pretend he was a normal guy?

No, Christian, you shouldn’t ignore the fact that he was a baby-killer and feign outrage because you sense that if you don’t, the pro-life movement will be doomed (although you’d be right, it would be doomed if we weren’t truly outraged).  

Christians should be outraged, for many reasons.  And we shouldn’t ignore any of the outrageous parts of this story.

Here’s a look at how things should have gone, or put another way, things to be (rightly) outraged about:

1) George Tiller should have been forced to stop practicing abortion, or killing babies, long ago, by the gov’t., whose primary job it is to protect and defend the people (especially the littlest and weakest ones) of our country.

2) If George Tiller had refused the gov’t’s demands and continued to kill innocent human life, he should have been put in prison or even faced capital punishment, where the law deemed that the correct course.

If that had been done, hundreds (thousands?) of babies would then have been spared his murdering, profit-hungry hand.  

3) A Kansas man should not have taken the law into his own hands in order to try and right this unspeakable wrong.  George Tiller was a law-abiding citizen, even though I believe he was a murderer.  And Tiller’s wrongs have not been righted by the Kansas man’s murderous act.  

The wrong has simply been added to.

It is a sad story indeed.

So, Christian, don’t pretend that because George Tiller was murdered that he was not a murderer himself.  And don’t think for one second his being a murderer in anyway justifies or mitigates his own unjust death.

 It doesn’t.  

His was a death wrought by a murderer apart from law or sanction.  Laws matter.  Laws matter to Christians.  We obey the law.  There is only one thing that would keep a Christian from obeying the law and that would be a law that would keep us from our worship of the Lord.  

We are not there yet, by God’s grace.

We walk a fine line, Christian pro-lifer.  We must cling to all we know of Christ.  We must do justly, love mercy and walk humbly with our God.  

We must heartily condemn the murdering of George Tiller, even while we acknowledge his murderous ways and pray that those like him will become outlawed in our land.

abortion: complex or painstakingly simple?

Our President recently said at his address to the graduating class at Notre Dame,

“Maybe we won’t agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this heart-wrenching decision for any woman is not made casually, it has both moral and spiritual dimensions.  

So let us work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions, let’s reduce unintended pregnancies.  Let’s make adoption more available.  Let’s provide care and support for women who do carry their children to term.”

So let me get this straight.

We’re agreeing that the decision to abort a baby is not one to be made casually.  Why not?  And is a decision that has moral and spiritual dimensions.  What would those be?  I’d really really like to know what the President thinks the moral and spiritual dimensions of abortion are.  

Is part of the “moral dimension” that a woman is making a decision to kill?  Is it that a doctor is complicit and profiting from this decision to kill?  

And is the “spiritual dimension” that an eternal soul is being put to death?  And that there’s no one standing in the gap for this eternal being, created in the image of God?

If there’s nothing wrong with abortion, then why make it rare?  Why not have one casually?

As President Obama acknowledges the “moral and spiritual dimensions” of abortion and asks us to work at making it rare, pro-lifers can take heart.  In his desire to be all things to all voters, he is conceding important ground in the abortion “conversation.” (I really hate don’t like that term.  When it’s babies dying, having a “conversation” is not exactly high on my priority list, but rather, saving babies.  I digress).

After all, there’s nothing conversational or civil or calm or reasoned when a baby is killed.  It’s violent.  It’s brutal.  It’s painful.  It’s very very ugly. 

The new (or old and re-used) M.O. of abortion advocates or “pr0-choicers” as they prefer to be called, is to throw out words like, “complex” or “complicated” when describing the situation surrounding a woman choosing abortion.  As though trying to navigate a difficult (abusive even) relationship with a boyfriend or figuring out career and college and baby make killing understandable and “complex.”

Yes, real life is always complex.  Situations are always multi-faceted.  Abuse is real.  Relationships are hard.  And killing a baby is still always evil.  

Often when discussing the Civil War, someone will throw out the assertion that the Civil War wasn’t really about slavery, it was about state’s rights.  As though it was just some crazy coincidence that all the states concerned about state’s rights were also the ones who wanted to keep their slaves.

I support state’s rights, but the truth is that the Southern states were using “state’s rights” as a cover for doing something so wicked and immoral that it dwarfed the issue they were covering it up with.  It couldn’t be covered up.  

Neither can abortion be covered up by saying it is complex or pointing to the sad stories of the women getting them.  The evil being perpetrated so dwarfs the difficult circumstance surrounding it to make it null.  And I fear for and pity those who so strongly advocate for the “rights” of these women.  I do not speak with winsome softness towards them.  To do that would be to dishonor those sacrificed on the hard altar of convenience.

The cop-out, “I call myself pro-life, but I’m not comfortable with making abortion illegal,” just doesn’t work for me.  Slavery didn’t end because of people saying, “I’m anti-slavery, but I’m just not comfortable making it illegal.  Let’s just work to make slavery rare.”

One day, history will look at pro-choicers with the same disdainful wonderment that it now gazes at those who fought for slavery.  And to them I say, it’s not too late to change your mind.  And I pray that you will.  For your own sake and the sake of those dying.

the designer baby boondoggle

A fertility clinic in LA has finally gone all the way.  

They are now offering “designer babies,” meaning their clients can request certain traits for their babies like dark skin or blue eyes.  The clinic has not yet delivered on this promise, but is offering it nonetheless. 

I get the feeling that when people hear the term “designer babies” they think that the scientists are somehow doing the designing.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  There is one Designer and He has no rival.  

Scientists can no more cause a baby to have green eyes than the man on the moon.  They are not creating or giving babies certain genes, they’re not even modifying genes, they’re simply killing off the embryos that have the unwanted genes.

They used to limit this killing to “extra” babies; for instance the couple who makes 10 embryos, but doesn’t want 10 babies, so they only implant 2.  The rest would be killed.  This has  also involved killing off the embryos that had “defects.”  Like the ones with downs syndrome or a likely hood of disease.  

Now scientists search through embryos for the couples (or singles, to be sure) until they get the combination of eyes, nose and health that is desirable for them.  The scientists aren’t designing the baby with the desired traits, they simply screen the embryos until the desired result is found, then kill off the rest.

The BBC reports:

The science is based on a lab technique called preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD.  This involves testing a cell taken from a very early embryo before it is put into the mother’s womb.

Doctors then select an embryo free from rogue genes – or in this case an embryo with the desired physical traits such as blonde hair and blue eyes – to continue the pregnancy, and discard any others.

The Wall Street Journal seems to misunderstand what is actually being done in PGD.  They say:

While PGD has long been used for the medical purpose of averting life-threatening diseases in children, the science behind it has quietly progressed to the point that it could potentially be used to create designer babies.

Let’s be clear.  PGD is not used to “avert life-threatening diseases in children.”  It is the life-threatening disease.  PGD kills the embryos that show any proclivity to imperfection.  So it is not protecting children.  It is protecting parents from the “hardship” of having a child with imperfection.  

Not only that, PGD doesn’t “create” anything.  It eliminates (scientists like to use the word “selects” cause it sounds better).  I can’t believe the way this is being reported.  As though the slippery slope is just beginning with designer babies.  

Wake up!  We already slid down the slope when we started eliminating the embryos with potential “problems.”  I’m riled up.  Can you tell?

abortion, race and the deceit of intentions

I ran across this article from 2006 that sheds a lot of light on our human “intentions” to do good.  We delude ourselves with claims for good intentions, even when evil results from them.  

In this story, the Dutch PM got his nose out of joint after a high European official likened the Dutch policy of killing ill or disabled babies to Nazi practices.  It was a true observation.  Of course, the Dutch PM wasn’t embarrassed by the killing of the babies, only of being compared to a Nazi.  Sad.

Here’s what the author,Wesley J. Smith says,

But they [Dutch officials] claim that the Netherlands’ infant euthanasia program is substantially different: Dutch doctors are motivated by compassion whereas the Germans’ were motivated by the bigotry of racial hygiene. Of course it is the act of killing disabled and dying babies that is wrong, not the motivation.

I can’t help but think of the racism of abortion when I read this.  A highly disproportionate number of African American babies are killed by abortion each year.  If we were told that African American babies were being killed because of racial genocide we would be outraged.

But when we hear that African Americans represent only 12% of the population of the United States, yet they account for 35% of the abortions performed in this country (according to the Center for Disease Control), no one seems to care.

Abortion is wrong no matter what the race of the baby.  But, if you’re pro-choice (or just apathetic), doesn’t it make your skin crawl just a little to think that by not opposing abortion you are giving tacit endorsement to the disproportionate killing of a race of people?  If the killing of babies doesn’t make you shudder, how about the lopsided killing of a race?  

Having something in common with Hitler should make us uneasy.  But abortion itself should be the real shame-producer.

Even when we believe our intentions to be good (ie I don’t want a young African American woman to have to have a baby, with no father and no money if she doesn’t want to), it doesn’t make the results any less horrific (ie the unequal killing of a particular race).  

It’s like China’s abortion policy: it results in the killing of baby girls in much greater numbers than boys.  I’ve heard pro-abortionists bemoan this fact.  They like the “one-child policy,” but think that there should be no discrimination in aborting.  What kind of perverse thinking is this?  The answer isn’t to become an equal opportunity killer.  The answer is to stop killing.  

If it’s wrong to abort more girls than boys, then it’s wrong to abort at all.  If it’s wrong to abort more African American babies than white babies, then it’s wrong to abort babies.  

Pro-abortionists’ intentions may appear to be good.  We hear things like, “Let’s make abortion rare.”  The intent behind a statement like this seems good, but the ugly practical reality goes like this: “Let’s keep abortion legal.  Let’s fund abortion with tax-payer dollars. Let’s give young kids condoms and hope they don’t get pregnant.  Let’s get rid of any and all restrictions to abortion.”  

In other words, pro-choicers who intend to make abortion rare, end up making it common.

Proverbs 8:36 “..all who hate me love death.”  Proverbs 12:10 “..the mercy of the wicked is cruel.”

pro-life reading for the youngest among us

I just read Dr. Suess’s Horton Hears a Who! for the first time last week.  The kids got it for Christmas and it’s one of the Dr. Suess books that I’ve never read.  I was really missing out!  

This now replaces Green Eggs and Ham as my favorite Dr. Suess book.

Most surprising of all, was the amazing pro-life message it offers.  Horton, a large elephant, discovers a voice coming from a speck of dust.  He comes to find out that it’s not just a voice, but a whole town called Whoville that lives on the speck.

So Horton, lovingly and protectively, guards the speck, now lodged on a clover.  Carrying the clover everywhere he goes, his motto repeats, “Because, after all, a person’s  a person, no matter how small.”  

He faces persecution from a kangaroo and a pack of monkeys, who are set on boiling the clover in beezle-nut oil, in order to get Horton to give up his obsession of protecting the clover.  They don’t believe that there are any people on the speck.  They think Horton is crazy and don’t care about the supposed Who’s of Whoville.  

Finally, after Horton as been mauled and beaten, the Who’s of Whoville shout as loud as they can, all together, with even the smallest Who doing their best, and the monkeys and kangaroo hear the Who’s at last.  

The town is saved and the elephant smiles saying, “They’ve proved they ARE persons, no matter how small.  And their whole world was saved by the Smallest of All.”  

The book ends with the conversion of the kangaroo.  He says, “From sun in the summer.  From rain when it’s fall-ish, I’m going to protect them.  No matter how small-ish.”

Some make subjective the issue of aborting babies, saying, “Is this really life?”  But we know that babies in the womb are alive; they certainly aren’t dead.  Or, “Is it viable?”  The time of viability keeps getting younger and younger. Or, “Is it a human?”  Well, it definitely isn’t a monkey or an elephant.  

The question is, will our society protect the smallest among us?  Those who, like the Who’s of Whoville, have no way to protect themselves from the bigger people around them.  

I want to be more like Horton.  Even beaten and mauled, he protected those who could not protect themselves.  He made converts out of people that had boiling beezle-nut oil.  

Horton had guts and love.  We could all use a little more of those.