Life experiences shape who we are and who we are to become. Early in my midwifery career I believed abortion was a woman’s “choice.” I knew I could never have an abortion, but felt I had no right to tell someone they had to have a baby.
As a nurse-midwife I occasionally counseled women who sought an abortion. I saw their fear, anguish and hopelessness and my heart broke for them. Some were women I knew for years and I knew how difficult a choice it was for them. I knew they were good, loving women who were terrified. They believed it was either their life or the baby’s life. I held their hand during the procedure.
I knew exactly what was happening when the suction machine was turned on. A part of me died each time as I witnessed the end of an innocent human life and saw the anguish and regret on the mother’s face.
Over the years several experiences caused me to rethink my belief in “a woman’s choice.” The experience I remember most vividly was when I was examining a teenager who was five months pregnant and the baby kicked my hand. I asked, “Did you feel that? That’s the baby moving.” She and her boyfriend looked at me and said, “They said I could still get rid of it!” My heart broke and I thought, “What have we taught our children?”
I thought a great deal about that question. I had two small children at the time and thought about what I wanted to teach them and what the world taught them. I came to realize that abortion teaches our children that their very existence depends on someone thinking they are valuable and wanted. They have no intrinsic value unless someone more powerful gives them value. For that is what abortion does: it gives the power of life or death to another person, not to God. That is not the lesson I wanted to teach my children.
That was the last time I facilitated an abortion. It was also the beginning of my conversion to the Catholic faith.
Church teaching has and always will condemn abortion as intrinsically evil. Good can never come from evil. The ends, no matter how much you want to believe they are good, can never justify evil means. Cooperation with evil taints our soul and separates us from God.
I have to live with my choice – my cooperation in evil – but I will no longer remain silent. This election has reminded me how important it is to speak up for our children.
As a convert to the Catholic faith I learned that “God is love.” Jesus Christ came to save us not only by dying for our sins, but by showing us how to love; to show us what sacrificial love really means.
So I ask, where is love in abortion? Where is love in the taking of innocent life? Where is love in a mother willing the death of her child? It sounds harsh and ugly, but sometimes the truth is harsh and we must face the ugliness of our actions.
Abortion breeds confusion, despair and death, and not only for the innocent babies. It lies to women, saying, “It’s like you were never pregnant.” But she knows the truth. Abortion robs the woman the opportunity to love, to understand that true love and sacrifice go hand in hand. It robs the child of the opportunity to grow and become the person God created them to be. Abortion robs family and friends the opportunity to love the woman and child and to grow in compassion. Abortion robs us of our humanity and distorts us so we are no longer the image of God.
We need to remember that our hope is with our children. It is not with you or me, but with the children, who are here now and those yet to be born. This lesson of hope and love is found at MiraVia on the campus of Belmont Abby College, a residence for single women attending college who choose to have their babies – to be countercultural, to choose life. It is a joy and privilege to spend time with these brave, strong young women who choose love and hope instead of despair and fear. They are fully aware of the challenges they face and they do it with grace and dignity every day. Hope is here. Love is here. But not fear.
Hope and love are in the teachings of the Catholic Church. Catholic teaching on the sanctity of all human life from the moment of conception to natural death are beautiful. Each of us has dignity and worth because we are created by God in His image and loved by Him. Our dignity does not come from another person, but from God alone. When we lose sight of this truth, we lose what makes us truly human: our ability to love and hope.
As Catholics, as Christians, as human beings, we need to believe in the dignity and worth of every person or we will not only cease to be Catholic, but cease to be fully human.
Susan Piening holds a Masters of Science in Nursing from Columbia University, a master’s degree in theology from Holy Apostles Seminary and College in Cromwell, Conn., and is certified by the National Catholic Bioethics Center. She is a parishioner of St. Michael Church in Gastonia.