Sunday, March 02, 2008
FROM THE EMAILBOX - Operation Outcry
Spirit & Life®
"The words I spoke to you are spirit and life." (Jn 6:63)
Human Life International e-Newsletter
Volume 03, Number 09 | Friday, February 29, 2008
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www.hli.org
Operation Outcry
In every country where abortion is being promoted, the insistent mantra of the abortion promoters is the lie that "unsafe (i.e., illegal) abortion" is damaging women's lives and should be replaced by "safe and legal" abortion.
The transformation of abortion from illegal to legal is supposed to make it - magically - safe for women. That was but one of the many lies about abortion that the US Supreme Court swallowed in 1973 when it legalized this killing procedure. While the abortion industry itself admitted that most of the illegal abortions were done by trained doctors in the comfort of their offices, very few arguments were as persuasive as the one that said women would be served by eliminating "back-alley" abortions and replacing them with abortion on demand. This pernicious lie is still a favorite argument of the abortion industry around the world, and they must marvel at how easily people fall for it.
Well, we know how to undo that lie. The same way we undo any lie: we defeat it with the truth. We are quick to acknowledge that abortion is never safe for unborn children, but 35 sad years of destruction has taught us that it's also a lie to think that legal abortion is safe and pain-free for women. Post-abortive women everywhere are the best witnesses to the truth about abortion, and that truth is very simple - there is no such thing as a safe abortion! Period. This testimony is valid both for our own fight here in the United States to overturn Roe as well as for our fight to keep this evil out of abortion-free countries. We need to join that fight as best we can and we now have a way to do that.
I have recently discovered a most worthy project for post-abortion testimonies called Operation Outcry. I am impressed by the scope of their work and the goal that they have set for themselves. This project is sponsored by the Texas Justice Foundation, the group that brought Norma McCorvey (the Roe of Roe v. Wade) back to the Supreme Court to let her story be heard. They want to collect one million "declarations" of post-abortion stories which will be entered into the public record when abortion comes back up before the Supreme Court. They are relying on various pro-life organizations to get the word out to post-abortive women and men who can declare, in a fully confidential manner, that abortion is not the salvation that it was promised to be in 1973 or ever.
In the face of the Supreme Court's ongoing commitment to Roe, the ones who have had real experience of those negative effects are able to testify to the highest court in our land something that we have always known: that abortion is a damaging, degrading and desperate procedure. It robs babies of their lives and women and men of their dignity. We think the Supreme Court needs to hear this message. In fact, the Texas Justice Foundation was the only pro-life brief that was cited in the recent partial birth abortion decision, and so we think there is a fighting chance.
Please do consider looking at the website of Operation Outcry and join in the effort to get declarations from one million women and men who have been affected negatively by abortion. The lie has to be countered by a strong witness to the truth, and after 35 years of abortion on demand, many people certainly have a strong witness to offer. There is no time like the present to use it!
Sincerely Yours in Christ,
Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer,
President, Human Life International
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HERE IS ONE OF THE STORIES
Cynthia Collins, Louisiana State Leader
I was nineteen, a freshman in college and pregnant from my first boyfriend. A friend told us to go to Planned Parenthood. It was January of 1973 – same month, same year as Roe v. Wade. The counselor from Planned Parenthood sat across from me and said, “You can go to Washington, DC and get an abortion … abortion will be legal and safe pretty soon.” What I found out was that just because abortion is legal does not mean it is safe.
At the abortion facility, I was placed in a room with 40 other women. An empty fetal model was held up for us to see. The force of the suction was severe, and I began to bleed heavily. There was no doctor-patient relationship. I never saw the abortionist before the abortion, and I never saw him again.
Within a year I was diagnosed with fibrocystic breast disease, deeply depressed, full of guilt, and drinking heavily and using drugs. I left college after my sophomore year and began a destructive lifestyle of promiscuity, pain, and aborted pregnancies. Abortion hadn’t solved my “problem,” it added to my pain.
During one abortion, part of my baby was left inside me. Planned Parenthood had referred me to an abortionist who did menstrual extractions. I was given no anesthetic. After crying in deep pain, with my arms grabbing the wall, the abortionist looked at me in fear. He told the nurse that I was too far along. He told me to get up, get dressed, and get out. I continued to bleed heavily for days. I was admitted to the hospital for an emergency D & C to remove the rest of the baby.
For years, I denied that abortion was the cause of the pain and deep loss in my soul. I thought: The government mad, it legal, so it must be okay. I was never told that abortion could be damaging my body or that I was taking another human life.
One year after marriage, I miscarried our son, Peter. His death in my womb was due to the scarring in my uterus from the abortions.
When my son, John, was eight-years-old, he said to me, “Mom, I feel there was somebody else before me … .” Abortion does not end on the abortionist’s table. Abortion affects the generations to come.
Abortion hurts women, children and the families of Louisiana and this nation. Women deserve life-affirming alternatives for both mother and child – no matter how a child is conceived.
