How abortion can be more anti-women than we could ever recognize
“Abortion is profoundly anti-women. Three-quarters of its victims are women: Half the babies and all the mothers.” — Mother Teresa
There has been a lot of talk about the rights of women in relation to having an abortion. Many people claim that women have a right to their own bodies, and to their own life. Abortion, they say, would help the woman to be in better control of her life.
But one thing I would like to read more about is the concern for the souls of all those mothers who chose to abort their children. If a mother is not someone who believes in the religious sense that aborting the fetus in her womb is the same as killing her own child, will the mother still suffer any guilt from having an abortion? Even before the procedure, will the motherly instinct still be there to somehow tell her that she needed to protect her child?
A Motherly Instinct
I would like to think that mothers, no matter what their religious beliefs are, have that inherent feeling of compassion for the child in her womb. It is only when people around her tell her that what she has is not a child but a mere clump of cells that she begins to think otherwise.
I would also like to think that every mother who has ever had an abortion underwent a painful, if not a tragic experience she would never wish to go through again. Beyond all the words and arguments said, and beyond everything that women were made to believe, a mother is still a mother. Perhaps the reason she could be deceived into believing that a child is nothing more than a cluster of cells belonging to her body is because that child is indeed a part of her, a part of her very heart.
A Culture of Death
What greater tragedy is there when a whole culture turns away the mother from her own child? What greater triumph is there for evil when the one who was supposed to protect her own was the very one used to end her child’s life?
What abortion does to the soul of mothers aborting their children is far more tragic than any other topic being discussed in relation to abortion. The sacrificial character of women is being used against them whenever they think that the emotional burden they are making is worth it if it means not having their children experience the suffering they could through.
In end, it is not other people who will suffer the most from losing these children. In the end, it is the mother who would weep most terribly for the child that she has lost.
“A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.” - Jeremiah 31:15, WEBBE
Hope and Forgiveness
In the light of this tragedy, Pope John Paul II in his encyclical EVANGELIUM VITAE (The Gospel of Life) wrote words of consolation and hope for such mothers:
“I would now like to say a special word to women who have had an abortion. The Church is aware of the many factors which may have influenced your decision, and she does not doubt that in many cases it was a painful and even shattering decision. The wound in your heart may not yet have healed. Certainly what happened was and remains terribly wrong. But do not give in to discouragement and do not lose hope. Try rather to understand what happened and face it honestly. If you have not already done so, give yourselves over with humility and trust to repentance. The Father of mercies is ready to give you his forgiveness and his peace in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. To the same Father and his mercy you can with sure hope entrust your child.”
Jocelyn is the author of the books "To Love an Invisible God" and "366 Days of Compassion." The deepest wounds of the soul are healed only by compassion...
Excellent! This message needs to be shouted from the rooftops. So many people ignore the suffering of those who've had an abortion, as well as the great tragedy abortion is to femininity in general.