Ministering to the Post-Aborted Woman

"Shepherds, Behold your Flock"

By Olivia L. Gans

After more than 25 years of legal abortion one would think that people would now have a real understanding of the difficulties encountered by women who have had abortions and how to help them. This is absolutely not the case, even, unfortunately in clerical circles. While that may seem a bold statement to make it is the truth.

During the course of the last 15 years of pro-life activity I've had the important and humbling task of addressing numerous clergy representing a wide variety of faiths. Usually I have been asked to share my own abortion experience.
It has always amazed me how often mine is the first real woman's story many of the participants have heard. What this proves to me is both how very hard it is for women to speak to others about this subject and how mothers and fathers of aborted children are in desperate need of spiritual support or guidance. Church is often the last place some of us would think of going to for help. This is a sadness that our clergy must change.

Many women have turned to a variety of self destructive behaviors including drugs, alcohol, sex, rebellion, and other means to vent anger and relieve pain. Their hearts are searching for that peace that comes only from the loving presence of the Creator Himself in their tragic lives. The One who made our unborn children also made us and that love that made us continues, despite our foolishness.

Many of us have seen that heavenly love for the first time in the holy and kind ministry of our pastors. We can thank God for them. Yet what is the difference that makes it possible for some to seek His forgiveness and real healing while others fade in and out of the painful life they are trying to live?

By and large, women who have had abortions struggle with many of the same issues - - grief, despair and alienation - - that others experience with a death or loss but with a profound added component: This death experience was caused by their own personal rejection of or confusion about the life they carried. Their behavior and sinful actions created the seemingly inescapable situation in which they currently suffer.

In my experience, one of the main reasons that women who have had abortions stay locked in their silence is the simple fact that they don't hear others speaking about their circumstances in a realistic way. Some are even attempting to go to church but keep this last great secret because what they hear there doesn't fit in with what they feel.

In most cases they never hear any words about abortion, either positive or negative, from the pulpit so they think they must be the odd ones. No one else seems to be thinking about it, so why am I?

What do women need to hear? Voices filled with compassion, truth, and hope that can be found in those who have confronted their own muddled self-image and discovered that forgiveness is possible. They need to believe that the people who speak to them actually believe that their lives have the same value in God's eyes as the lives of their discarded, but not forgotten children.

Many believe that God will not hold out a hand to them because they would not hold out a hand to themselves. They may feel hatred toward themselves because they have been allowed to believe that God doesn't love them. Hearing the receiving and forgiving voice of the shepherds makes it much easier to seek the ultimate source of the compassion that will rescue them from inescapable pain.

It may come as a surprise that there are women in church pews all over America who have confessed all other kinds of awful sins but can not tell anyone about the big one, abortion. It is as if there is, somewhere deep in the bruised hearts of these mothers, a sense that this is seriously different from other things she may have done. After all, as Scripture says in Isaiah, "Shall a mother forget the child of her womb? Yet even should she forget I will not forget you."

Pastors need to ponder, as the woman may have, that she is the mother who forgot. For her to believe that God will forgive her is an enormous jump. Few of the mothers are able to believe that having broken that most marvelous of bonds, the one used by the Creator to describe His bond to us, that He still may have a purpose for their lives.

Imagine her amazement when she learns that God does love her and has true desire to lead them to the paths of peace. (Jeremiah 29:11-14) For most women, that path involves going through a period of true grief. The vast majority of these women have never openly shed tears for the little ones they can never hold.
Few of them have encountered religious leaders who they truly felt would look at them and not be shocked if they told the truth of their distress. In fact some of them have left meetings with their shepherds sometimes feeling more alienated than before.

It is hard for these women to really trust anyone so they often hedge their bets, they hold some of the cards back because they don't feel completely safe. It is interesting to note, however, just how often the desire for a spiritual perspective is the force behind the first effort to reach out for help.

That puts much of the onus on the clergy to open the doors. But who better to extend that hand of invitation than the clergy?

I would say to clergy, preach often and joyfully about the triumph of God over sin and despair! Tell the truth to your congregations about the harm done by abortion to unborn children and to the hearts of all who are involved, moms, dads, doctors, etc.

If you don't know the facts, do your homework; the books are out there aplenty. Take time to develop the healing ministries being widely developed by pro-life groups and churches across the country. Preach about them often. Only you, who have been chosen, called by name to shepherd, can do this marvelous thing.

Most importantly, expose yourself to God's forgiveness and healing. As a wise and good friend in this ministry has said, all of us have aborted God's will at one time or another. The deeper our own experience of the Lord's mercy is and the more developed our spiritual life becomes, the more we will able to convey the truth of God's love to the brokenhearted. The essential component of this labor is restoring hope to the hopeless, something with which every pastor should have a wealth of experience.

The further away I get from my own abortion in 1981 and from the initial stages of the healing journey the more I begin to see that this is a lifetime process. Yes, the first part is the grief which led to my asking for, and receiving, God's forgiveness. The second stage involved learning when, where, and how to remember my child's life and death, the tragedy but also the triumph of God's goodness over it. For me personally that has meant sharing my story in public for over 16 years; that is not necessarily the right course for every woman. Now it is time to discover the will of my Creator for the rest of my life.

It is vital that any healing effort be directed towards bringing the person, whether it be the mother, father, or anyone closely involved, to a deeper awareness of their life with God. In this time of healing, every effort should be made for them, to discover that great Love that made the Creator so happy the day He created them. The story begins there and with tools to build a mature spiritual life this healing can reach its completion in a peaceful and affirming life.