If you’ve read any of my other posts you will know that I am passionately pro-life. And not just politically conservative, or Republican, but PRO-LIFE. And I am trying to “put my money where my mouth is” by volunteering with our local pregnancy clinic, the local maternity home, our local Right-to-Life chapter, and so on (and, of course, helping financially). Not to mention having been married to a post-abortion survivor (she had three abortions) for 20 years, and holding her through many times of agony and tears and regrets.
So, a couple of weeks ago I read a question on Quora.com (where I also sometimes write answers) asking basically this: “Are any ‘pro-life’ people actually willing to pay medical costs, etc. for a woman to deliver the baby they are forcing her to keep?” At first I was alternately offended, defensive, responding back (in my head) with righteous indignation, disgusted with the hypocrisy (and bitterness) inherent in such a question, and formulating fiery responses in my head. But the next day I believe God my Father told me simply to “Think about it”….
So, I did. and several things came up in rather rapid succession:
- I can say I am completely willing, as are all the pro-life people I work with, to do whatever it takes to support a woman in choosing to give birth to her child. But I have to admit it would be hard (financially, emotionally, etc.) to do when the time came. I mean, I am a grandfather: how easy would it be to go back to essentially my twenties and stay up nights with a crying baby, not to mention the almost astronomical costs of childbirth in a hospital these days. And on and on. And I have to admit I hadn’t really thought through these things in terms of, “what am I asking a woman to go through, in not aborting her child?” I’m sure most of you HAVE thought through this, but, for me, it was a bit of an eye-opener.
- Without knowing the questioner’s moral stance, livelihood, or basically anything about him/her, I can still say for almost certain that anyone forcing a woman into abortion is NOT very willing to pay the almost certain costs to her in terms of emotional, psychological, often medical damage and hurt, not to mention the possibility of death, infertility, risk of miscarriage, depression, grief, and more, all of which are documented side-effects of abortion. Why can I say this? For one: abortion is all about avoiding the costs and responsibilities of raising a child in the first place, so why would anyone wanting to avoid these basic costs want to incur any other costs/risks/responsibilities if they could avoid them? So, on a secondary level I was disgusted at the blatant hypocrisy of the question.
- But, much further down the train of thinking came the thought: if I want and believe in the end of legalized abortion in this country, then what? What do things look like after that? Do we just return to the “good-old days” of back-alley abortions, of stigma and trauma and shame? What is the compassionate position we should be taking as truly “pro-life” people for the inevitable result of 1000s (millions?) of women and men who still do not want the responsibility of raising the child they created, and yet are unable to now have an abortion to “take care of” the “problem”? Are we willing, able, and prepared to actually support these women and men through the DIFFICULT scenario they face? Are we able and prepared to do the education and counseling, and make the societal changes necessary to ensure that we don’t have a backlash that would potentially bring back Roe v. Wade in perhaps an even more horrible version (such as we have seen this last year in New York and other places, actually legalizing what amounts to euthanasia (or legalized murder, in my view) of a child even after delivery if the mother “doesn’t want it”)? We only have to look back not even 100 years to see what happened to the carefully crafted and long-fought-for Prohibition, and the backlash that led to its eventual repeal, to the state we are now in where not only alcohol, but marijuana, even potentially more lethal and dangerous drugs have been/are being legalized…. If history is any teacher, I’m pretty certain that we could face the same kind of backlash after Roe v. Wade is overturned in 10-20 years, if not sooner.
So, in short, I believe God was asking me to think about what I am, what we are asking for, and to be prepared to fight the even harder fight to make sure the change is permanent.
How can I, how can WE do that? What even do we need to be prepared for, realistically?
And what if the Abolitionists win (see my previous post on “Abolition“)? What if after Roe v. Wade is overturned, the law of the land becomes murder charges not only for the doctor, but the woman (maybe even the man) who is involved in a now illegal abortion? What do we imagine the backlash to that will be after almost 50 years (approaching two generations) of legalized, even free, abortion on demand?
Now let me say, NONE OF THIS is intended to even suggest that I want to keep abortion legal. That is unthinkable; to me the equivalent of legalizing murder. But, having God ask me to think about this to me means that there IS something to think about, to ponder deeply, to do something about. Nor should you infer that I have any doubt about the future of Roe v. Wade — the blood of 60+ million unborn children is crying out to God for justice. He is NOT going to leave their cry unheard!
But to me this became very personal as I pondered the question: What would I do if a young woman came to me and angrily demanded that I had a responsibility to help her deal with her unwanted pregnancy now that abortion was off the table because of MY vote, MY pro-life stance and MY work? Could I just answer that her stance is immoral, unjust, and her own fault, so she just “suck it up” and deal with it? Should I threaten her with murder charges, jail, the ruin of her life if she goes through with a back-alley abortion (and mind you, I don’t for one second imagine there won’t be such people, any less than there were no speakeasies or moonshine stills during Prohibition)? Should we distribute condoms to all middle-school children and teach them about “safe sex” so they won’t get pregnant? Should we have all “wayward” teens sterilized so they couldn’t possibly have “unwanted” pregnancies? Or, … or …? God forbid we should respond AT ALL like any of this!!!
Or, should we have now government-funded pregnancy clinics (a possibility most pro-life clinics have avoided like the plague, because of the specter of government control that goes along with funding), and mandatory referrals to them for any unwanted pregnancy?
Will we just sit back, pat ourselves on the back for having achieved our goal of Roe v. Wade being overturned and let America (and the rest of the world) “deal with it”? Is that what Jesus would do?
But I think the hardest thought for me was this: given the CERTAINTY that there will (always) be women who refuse any good counsel, or laws, and have sex, get pregnant, and then refuse to go through with the pregnancy, what should we do for/with this situation? Should there be (shudder) some legalized abortion route for the truly recalcitrant? Like we have a minimum drinking age (that virtually no one that I know obeys)? To “limit” abortions to the truly desperate? Should we legally enforce adoptions? What if that leads to an increase in the rate of adoption abuse, where people get into the business of “adopting” children of unwanted pregnancies simply for the opportunity of financial gain, or worse?? Any number of HORRIBLE scenarios come rushing to my mind, and I’m overwhelmed…
I could almost start to think that it might be better to simply leave things as they are, than to deal with such possible nightmare scenarios once Roe v. Wade is gone. I did say “almost”. I can’t go there. But I have a feeling that not only myself, but maybe many of us in the pro-life movement haven’t really thought about what’s next. Maybe some, even many, have been thinking and planning, but I personally have never once had such a conversation, or read such a book or such an article, or even heard the question asked. So, I’m asking it: After Roe v. Wade, Now What?
I don’t have the answers (obviously) yet. But if we don’t even ask the question, I’m certain we won’t have any answers when the time comes either.
But, actually, I do think we have some of the answers. Already. We do have 1000s of pro-life pregnancy clinics all over the country. We do have prayer chains everywhere, millions of prayers going up to our Heavenly Father, for justice, for mercy, for help. We do have maternity homes in many places, we have adoption agencies, and trained counselors, we have many, many women who have gone through unwanted pregnancies, who have survived rape, and incest, and kept their babies, and know what it takes to do that. We have men and women who survived abortions in the womb, and have found the grace to survive, to forgive, and to be tireless advocates for the unborn.
What I’m most uncertain about, however, since we are seeking for legal changes, for laws to be repealed, for societal “norms” now set in concrete for almost 50 years to be upended, is what the legal framework should be, what the societal changes must look like, what the educational and religious and moral underpinnings of our country must be or become so that all of our gains are not lost in an even greater atrocity.
Thanks for reading.