Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Newsweek’s ‘Competing Emotions’ on Abortion



Newsweek writer Sarah Kliff visited a late-term abortion clinic in Omaha, Nebraska and said that her reaction surprised her. It wasn’t watching the abortion that unsettled her (she observed a first-term abortion), it was interacting with women and men in the waiting room and observing their emotional angst:

“But there was a discomfort I hadn’t expected, my emotional reaction to watching abortions. It happened when I watched a married couple, in their mid-30s, the husband squeezing his wife's hand, stroking her forehead. Another woman, a single mom with a 10-year-old daughter, started crying when we talked about abortion. ‘I think it’s OK,’ she told me, ‘but it’s hard to see everyone doing it, there’s so many. I’m not mad at them at all. It's just like, wow, there are so many people. There are seven or eight babies out there [in the waiting room].’” Read more.

Kliff is disturbed by what she sees and observes the same emotional conflict and ambivalence among fellow Americans. She points out that while a majority may support Roe v. Wade, many are still uncomfortable with what abortion really is – the taking of human life (or “the potential for life”, she says).

Unsettled feelings about abortion are a sign that it is not a morally neutral medical procedure.

Nevertheless, our feelings should not ultimately dictate our position. Even though we have compassion on a woman considering abortion in the hardest of circumstances, abortion is never the most loving answer.

The best response is to offer compassionate support and practical help to help her carry to term.

Find out how you can get involved in this critical work today by volunteering at a local pregnancy center in your community.

1 comments:

Unknown said...

I think abortion is the waste of human potential. I lost a sibling through abortion and I will never know if we would have been the best of friends .