Abby Johnson

Be not afraid to be countercultural

by

One night over dinner, a friend of mine told me that he had seen a very pregnant homeless woman on the corner of a busy Austin intersection. I knew the intersection he was referring to because there is a HUGE non-denominational church on the corner.

I felt confident that she had probably received some assistance from them. Maybe they were in the process of trying to help her find resources. One of the friends with us at dinner, Heather, is the executive director of the Austin Coalition for Life, a non-profit group who holds daily vigils outside of Austin’s four abortion clinics. Their goal is to connect abortion-minded women with pregnancy resources in the area to help them choose life for their child.

I was about to deliver my own baby any day, so I was limited with what I could do to reach out to this woman. Heather said she would continue to go by the intersection until she found her. After several days of unsuccessful attempts, Heather was finally able to connect with her.

She explained that there were several pro-life agencies in town that could help her with housing both before and after her baby was born. They could also help with expenses, pre- and post-natal care, labor and delivery, food, clothing, and all of her other basic needs. She talked to her for a long time and found out that she was running from an abusive relationship and was trying to protect her unborn child from the father.

Heather’s next question was a pretty obvious one. Had the mega church, a few hundred feet away, offered to help her? Instead of asking the woman and putting her on the spot, Heather decided to go and ask the church if they knew anything about the woman. She was startled at the response.

“Well, one of our members took her to the Target Café to share the Gospel with her.” So, no material assistance was offered for her or her baby? No resources offered for where she could receive assistance? No phone calls made to maternity homes or pro-life groups in the area? “No,” the woman responded. “Just the meeting at Target to talk about the Lord.”

Well, isn’t that fantastic. The Gospel is wonderful, however, that isn’t extending help to her to find a hospital to deliver her baby in, to help her with food to nourish her body during the last few weeks of her pregnancy, to ensure she is safe from harm as she sleeps outside night after night. Their answer made me disgusted.

How can we expect to nourish someone spiritually when their physical needs aren’t met? How can we expect someone to be receptive to the Gospel when they go physically hungry during the day? How can we expect someone to believe in the mighty power of Christ when they don’t know if they will be forced to deliver their baby in an alley somewhere?

This is Christianity? This is how we treat those in need of help? Certainly not. That is not what faith is about. James clearly states that “faith without works is dead.” What is faith if we are not willing to step out of our comfort zone and get our hands dirty in service to Christ? We are called to be the “hands and feet of Christ,” right? That means service to those who need him, not just words, but actions too.

What does it mean to call ourselves are pro-lifers? Does it mean that we just don’t like abortion? Or does it mean that we are willing to go that extra step? Are we willing to take a young pregnant woman into our home to care for her when she has no one else? Are we willing to give sacrificially to those who have nothing? Are we willing to set our superficial judgment aside and truly be Christ-like? Are we willing to show mercy when others condemn? Are we willing to get our hands dirty?

Being pro-life isn’t always pretty, and it’s not only about “saving babies.” It’s about saving the person; the woman, the baby, the man involved, the family. Sometimes, it’s about putting someone else’s needs above our own. It’s about stepping out of the comfortable and moving into a place that is unfamiliar.

Is it comfortable to talk about abortion? Not always. Do people always want to hear about it? Not usually. However, silence breeds apathy and that is what we are soaked in, APATHY. The greatest breeding ground for apathy seems to be in our churches. Why is that? It’s not like the sanctity of human life isn’t ALL OVER Scripture.

It isn’t as if God didn’t make it pretty clear that life is sacred. We aren’t scared to talk about a slew of other “hot button” issues, but we tend to be silent on the number one issue that has invaded our churches. According to the Guttmacher Institute, 72 percent of women seeking abortions come from the church. I actually think that number is low. We performed very few abortions on women who proclaimed to be atheists or agnostic. No, many of them brought their bibles and/or rosaries to their abortion appointments. Many would ask if we would pray with them before the abortion procedure began.

APATHY is what keeps these church-going women coming to the abortion clinics over and over again. The churches are silent. The majority of clergy are silent. And their silence is DEAFENING! By not speaking up, they are telling those in their congregation who are suffering in silence that their sin of abortion is TOO BIG for God. That is a LIE.

Clergy who are silent on this issue are not doing any one any favors. They are doing their congregation an incredible disservice. With 72 percent of abortions coming from the church, a sermon once a year during the Sanctity of Human Life month is not enough!! People are hurting! They are in desperate need of healing and they have no idea where to go because the church is silent. We have become so concerned with “offending” others that we have forgotten about how much our apathy offends God.

If you are in a church where your pastor/priest actively speaks on the sanctity of human life, I encourage you to thank him, and thank him often. It is not easy, but it is right.

If you are not hearing the message of abortion and healing from the pulpit, I strongly urge you to go to your pastor and ask why. Share with them the reason that this is important to you. Share these statistics with them. Share your heart.

Just because your pastor is silent doesn’t mean you have to be. Stand up for life. Stand up and speak up. Lives are depending on it. It is time for the church to STAND UP.

Reader Interactions

Comments

    • My pastor seems to think there is nothing wrong with using contraception.i confronted him about it but he has this new age thinking.i no longer support this parish financially.i support pastors that are in communion with the Bishop of Rome and the teach sound doctrine.

      • Dear Santiago,It was the Lord himself that converted my heart to believe in Him, when I read the Bible given by evangelical friends. In a very dramatic way, he made me simultaneously pro-life. I returned to the Church after an almost thirty year hiatus. However, I was impatient with the teaching on contraception, even when I read some were abortifacient. To me, contraception was a lesser evil. However, now I have done a great deal of reading, which began when I followed up on memories from the early days of birth control, when I was a student nurse in the UK. I remember young women who had neurological symptoms attributed to the pill, some who had strokes. I remember an older women with pancreatitis blamed on the pill. Later, as an RN in a Birmingham, Alabama ICU, I took care of two women, teenagers, that had malignant hypertension. Again, the pill was implicated. And across the hall, unconscious, on a ventilator, was a thirty-five year old woman with pulmonary emboli caused by contraception,. Curious to find if this was still a problem, I discovered multiple law suits against the makers of four contraceptives, among them Yaz and Yasmin. Estrogen is listed by the WHO, along with asbestos and nicotine, as a Class 1 cancer causing substance. Breast and liver cancers, rare when I was young, are now commonplace. I also discovered that this substance is responsible for fish kills, and for male, egg-bearing fish, showing up all over the world.
        Progestins, such as Depo Provera, cause personality changes – the third most frequently reported side affect is aggression. Dr. Lionel Tiger, an atheist, has observed that women taking contraception when they meet their partners, turn around and reject them when they quit taking it. (Something to do with smell and pheromones). They also pick genetically similar partners and are thence prone to miscarriages, infertility and sickly children. Men, presented with a lineup of gorgeous women on contraception then plainer women who ovulate, prefer the ovulating women. Probably it is because testosterone levels increase in the presence of the ovulating group.
        Progestins also have been blamed for the rapid rise of HIV and HPV in women. The changes in cervical and vaginal mucosa make women susceptible to infection. Progestins have a greater failure rate. To avoid pregnancy, an ethical doctor will advise concurrent use of condoms. The Church’s wisdom clearly has preceded the discoveries of science.

  2. Oh, Abby- what that church failed to see was the gospel message is precisely what this woman needed to see, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me…” It is simply a question of how far we are willing to go with the gospel message. So sad that for many of Christ’s followers today, the answer is… not far enough.

  4. Oh, this brings me to tears! I am so sad by how little is done for women with child. Like Mary and Joseph looking for a room at the Inn! At least give the woman shelter. We need to stop fighting, protesting and boycotting and just start reaching out to help women. When nothing is said at church, either on the pulpit or in the pews, it leaves those who need to hear the message, completely unfed. As our Priest said last Sunday, God will look very mercifully on so many in our culture today because they do what they do because those who were supposed to teach them, failed. We can’t be silent anymore and we can’t wait for someone else to do the work. Amen Abby! Thanks for your courageous work.

  5. So what happened to this woman? Did Heather help her find assistance? Please tell us that she did.

  6. Abby, I am a birth doula and have been trying to start a doula program for women that need help. Have you heard of The Doula Project. It is an organization that provides doula support — FREE doula support — for women having abortions. That’s right, abortion doulas – free. Why do we not have a program to provide doula services to women who are NOT having abortions? I have become frustrated in trying to pitch this idea to the Church and have been ignored or not taken seriously because I am a covert. I have pitched this idea to other doulas, who become angry with me because if I provide free doula services, well then how will they justify charging $700 for their doula services? Most midwives are pro choice if you can believe that. As Catholics, we pray rosaries these women keep their babies and then send them on their way with a couple of cans of formula and say “God bless you,” as they walk out the door, into another abusive relationship. Do people not realize about 2 in 5 women have been sexually abused, which is how they ended up in these abusive “relationships”? These women are not loved, and those that are not loved are truly in poverty and tell me – how loved do you think their children will feel coming into a world that does not love their mothers, let alone them? I am starting to research this, to start a PRO LIFE doula project so that we can help women, truly, with love. The Church is lacking in this. I need help. Pray. Please.

  7. I couldn’t believe Abby’s comments about the silence in our churches. It is so silent up here the silence is truly deafening!! Trying to get voter guide flyers into our churches is an unbelievable job………..priests are so fearful and making all kinds of excuses. Even when these flyers and educational materials are written according to the guidelines that make them permissable in our churches. I think most clergy don’t have a clue as to what this government is doing and planning on doing if Obama wins. Still hearing that some Catholics do not know Obama’s pro-abortion record.We must figure out a way to get churches on board with the right information and for the right reasons. Fear cannot hold us captive any longer. Actually it is not holding us, some of the laity captive, but our churches seem to be under the spell of fear.

  8. I honestly hear nothing about any of the Mega “churches” doing anything for anyone except keeping the “pastors” in big houses and nice cars. These churches in Houston are denominational and non-denominational. To me, they are nothing but places people go to hear that they are ok and going to heaven so they feel good and empty their wallets. As a Catholic, at my church, we regularly hear about taking care of all people born and unborn and act upon that message.

  11. Abby, not all mega churches are created equally. I go to a large church and I can’t imagine the people of my church doing that. However, I think this is a great article and we need to be reminded the meaning of the Gospel. And I think it is wonderful that you and your friend were Jesus in action to that poor, battered woman who was trying to protect her baby from abuse. God bless you!!

  12. Unfortunately I find that unwanted pregancies and termination is still taboo and not talked about in the church. The subject is quietly swept under the rug. Perhaps if churches published resources in their bulletins, more women who are facing unwanted pregancies would turn to the church for help and spiritual guidance instead of running away from it. I (Protestant) have been to one Baptist church that had brochures for a local pregnancy crisis center, but I haven’t ever seen or heard anything at my own church (Methodist) regarding any Pro-Life action. If we can get more denominations to talk about Pro-Life issues perhaps it will reach someone sitting in the pew who thought she had no other choice.

  13. Amen sister. Few it seems realize that pregnancy is not a sin. And most are guilty of the sin that leads to it so I am wondering where all the judgement and condemnation (mostly on the woman) comes from and why women like myself would rather cave into the pressure abortion with all its horror than go through with such an obvious maternity sized scarlett letter in one’s church. This is the rationale of fighting between my old life and new; there has to be a better way

  15. MannerLutherans For Life desires to pattern its manner after Paul and “speak the truth in love.” Admittedly that is not always easy. Pro-lifers can become frustrated when our Biblical, reasonable, logical, and loving message is twisted and turned until we are compared to the Taliban! Pro-lifers can become angry at the deafening silence of so many in the church when 3,200 of God’s children are killed every day through abortion and in terribly cruel ways. This is a righteous anger. We should be angry! But we should not sin in our anger. Our anger should not lead us to violence or abrasiveness or arrogant insult. We should not return evil with evil. To do so only raises barriers and defenses that are often impenetrable.

  16. I want to thank you for your continued efforts in providing a true and powerful witness to the sanctity of human life by your peaceful, prayerful presence at abortion facilities. We have heard story after story of babies’ and young women’s lives saved in similar efforts throughout the country. We know you find it painful to see any type of violence against any person, especially the destruction of human life such as that in Massachusetts this past week, used to portray the pro-life movement as a violent one. It is our great respect for human life that motivates us to protest abortion and to do so in a peaceful, non-violent way.

  17. You see, abortion is an emotional issue. It is a moral matter. It’s also a legal issue where states make it so. But most of all, it is a spiritual matter. Unfortunately, most don’t realize that it’s a spiritual matter. God is the creator of life and what God says is the final word. His word issued from His throne in heaven is the ultimate supreme court.

  18. You’re words were very powerful and poignant, and I find myself asking what more can I do. This year, for the first time in my life, I plan to speak in a public forum about how abortion or should I say my mother’s choice not to abort me after being rape has effected my life. I had been able to talk about it one-on-one with people I knew were either contemplating an abortion or had one, but never on the scale that it will be next month. If I had it my way, I would’ve kept my conception a secret, but the Holy Spirit wouldn’t let me. He turned my apathy into agitation, and now my agitation is turning into action. I’ve identified a local pregnancy resource center where I want to serve, but what I can do right now is limited as I am in my 2nd trimester with my 2nd child. My husband & I are so grateful for the opportunity to create a legacy that will honor God, knowing that if my mom had crumbled under the opinions of others back in 1974 I wouldn’t be alive today. To God be the glory, and thank you for continuing to advocate for all that are touched by abortion.

  19. What does this have to say then to the practice of the wholesale abortion which is practised in so many countries today, our own included? It surely says that this butchery of human life must stink in the nostrils of God and will inevitably ultimately bring a fearful judgment from God. When millions of lives are snuffed out, in most instances the only reason being that that life is going to inconvenience whose who conceived it, going to upset their future plans and ambitions, such a thing can only be viewed as a national and indeed worldwide disaster by everyone who takes the Bible seriously. If we believe these things which we have looked at in the Bible today then we must raise our voices in protest against the mass killing which goes under the name of abortion. Some will be in a position to do more than others; providentially some will be able to be more effective than others; but everyone who accepts these three great truths ought to give what support they can to the protest against the slaughter of millions of human beings.

  20. 1) Then let’s invalidate Roe v Wade, since that case was decided by 5 out of 9 men. 2) American women have, for a long time, consistently and repeatedly polled, in the majority, pro-life. 3) Our own Facebook page is overwhelmingly ‘Liked’ by women. 67%, at the last count, are women. 4) Will you be willing to say that no woman can add any input about circumcision? You don’t know what it’s like to have part of your penis cut off. 5) Will you be willing to say that unmarried people can’t complain about wife-beating (or gay marriage) because you don’t know what it’s like to be married to a woman? Etc. 6) This conclusion entails committing the genetic fallacy. If your position commits a logical fallacy, that’s a great sign you should abandon the position. 7) >50% of all abortions are carried out against future women, whom we want to save. Sounds like we’re pretty pro-women to me. 8) We tell the truth to women even when it’s costly to us, and Planned Parenthood and ACORN lie to them to get more government funding. 9) And you can trust aborticians ? And popular atheist bloggers and published authors ?

  21. This post makes me think of James 2:14-17 where it says, “What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.”

  22. Oh, I completely agree!!! We have got to stop this! We’ve got to get in the midst of of people and HELP them instead of sitting at home judging them. It’s so frustrating for me to see the judgment and hate plastered on my facebook newsfeed all the time, while not one of those people is willing to actually take the time to try and help someone.

  23. What does this have to say then to the practice of the wholesale abortion which is practised in so many countries today, our own included? It surely says that this butchery of human life must stink in the nostrils of God and will inevitably ultimately bring a fearful judgment from God. When millions of lives are snuffed out, in most instances the only reason being that that life is going to inconvenience whose who conceived it, going to upset their future plans and ambitions, such a thing can only be viewed as a national and indeed worldwide disaster by everyone who takes the Bible seriously. If we believe these things which we have looked at in the Bible today then we must raise our voices in protest against the mass killing which goes under the name of abortion. Some will be in a position to do more than others; providentially some will be able to be more effective than others; but everyone who accepts these three great truths ought to give what support they can to the protest against the slaughter of millions of human beings.

  24. Nor is there a lack of families which, over and above their everyday service to life, are willing to accept abandoned children, boys and girls and teenagers in difficulty, handicapped persons, elderly men and women who have been left alone. Many centres in support of life, or similar institutions, are sponsored by individuals and groups which, with admirable dedication and sacrifice, offer moral and material support to mothers who are in difficulty and are tempted to have recourse to abortion. Increasingly, there are appearing in many places groups of volunteers prepared to offer hospitality to persons without a family, who find themselves in conditions of particular distress or who need a supportive environment to help them to overcome destructive habits and discover anew the meaning of life.

  25. Fourthly, are we simply content to tolerate the sinful world around us and sit on our hands until Jesus comes back? You are a sinner saved by grace, through faith, created for good works! If Jesus didn’t have a plan for your life, He would have taken you home already. We are not of this world…we are here to proclaim the gospel. Look around…abortions and racism abounds. We live in a sinful world. We are called to speak into our culture and share the gospel to a dying world. We are called to do something. I read “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” yesterday and I was inspired. Dr. King was used mightily of the Lord to tear down Satan’s strongholds. Yes, Dr. King had some well-documented flaws, but so do I…so does Tony…so does John Piper. We are all sinners saved by grace. One thing is for certain; men like Dr. King should inspire us. We should be “extremists” for Jesus. Like Tony said last week, we are praying for a church full of “Jesus freaks.” We believe that Jesus Christ is mighty to save so lets start acting like it! God used men like Dr. King to proclaim the gospel and radically change our culture…and He can use each and every one of us to do the same.

  26. What does this have to say then to the practice of the wholesale abortion which is practised in so many countries today, our own included? It surely says that this butchery of human life must stink in the nostrils of God and will inevitably ultimately bring a fearful judgment from God. When millions of lives are snuffed out, in most instances the only reason being that that life is going to inconvenience whose who conceived it, going to upset their future plans and ambitions, such a thing can only be viewed as a national and indeed worldwide disaster by everyone who takes the Bible seriously. If we believe these things which we have looked at in the Bible today then we must raise our voices in protest against the mass killing which goes under the name of abortion. Some will be in a position to do more than others; providentially some will be able to be more effective than others; but everyone who accepts these three great truths ought to give what support they can to the protest against the slaughter of millions of human beings.

  27. Thanks Abby for that story. A group of pro-lifers have been working for over four years to develop a DVD and a website: http://www.pastorsprolife.org just for the purpose of reaching a pastor’s heart and helping a pastor become a voice for the unborn. Please let me know what you think of this website and DVD “Dear Pastor…”. Thanks.

  29. Whatever is opposed to life itself, such as any type of murder, genocide, abortion, euthanasia, or willful self-destruction, whatever violates the integrity of the human person . . . all these things and others of their like are infamies indeed. They poison human society but they do more harm to those who practice them than those who suffer from the injury. Moreover, they are a supreme dishonor to the Creator” (Gaudium et Spes, 27).