How the Abortion Culture Affects Motherhood

This weekend I ran across a blog that features anonymous “mommy confessions,” where mamas can post some of their most cringe-worthy moments or try to help clear their consciences by revealing some terrible thing that they feel guilty about doing.  It was certainly an eye opener to read what some of the women wrote.  Of course, there was your typical I’m scared to breastfeed type admission.  There were quite a few I hate my husband entries.  There were some that were along the lines of I never make my child brush his teeth or All my son will eat is chicken nuggets.  

And, then there was a whole other category of confessions.  Here are a few that caught my eye:

Three children was too many.

It’s 9am and I just sent my five year old back to bed with a movie because I just can’t deal with him right now.

I buy my five year old video games so he can ignore me and I can ignore him.

Honestly, most of the time I don’t care what my kids are doing, just so long as they’re quiet.

Motherhood makes me feel smothered and alone.  I miss my freedom.

This is only a handful of the many confessions that seem to ooze regret.  I doubt these mothers would consciously admit that they wish they had never had children (although some of them do), but their statements certainly suggest that they wish they were doing something other than being mothers.

I can understand, to a certain extent, why these mamas wrote what they did.

Because motherhood is hard.  It’s tiring.  It’s never-ending.  It’s all giving.  It’s true, complete sacrifice.

But, there’s something much deeper going on here than a bunch of mothers who would rather be out drinking margaritas.  It’s a mentality that goes much, much further into our psyches, and I dare say that not one of us American mamas is immune to this way of thinking.

Because we were raised in the abortion culture.

We, current mothers of young children, can’t remember a time when abortion wasn’t an “issue” to rail against or to rally for.  If you’re like me and you grew up in church, you probably attended your fair share of candle light vigils and Sanctity of Life Sundays.  You wore your little baby feet pin in high school to show that you believe in tiny life in the womb and you may even have a pro-life bumper sticker on your car.

But, it doesn’t matter if you have a “My Uterus, My Choice” t-shirt in your closet or if you protest at abortion clinics.  You are a victim of the abortion culture’s indoctrination of young women.  And, chances are,  it shows in your mothering.

The abortion culture has taught us that children stand in the way of things that we want.  It has taught us that we deserve more than being at home with children on a Friday night.  It has told us that it is possible to “not be ready” for kids.  It has instilled in women a lack of confidence in our ability to handle children.  It has produced the feeling that it can be a mistake to have a child or a mistake to have more than one.

The abortion culture has lied that it is better for a child to have no mother at all than to have an imperfect one.

And so, even if we feel like we are pro-life to our core, if we really stop and examine the way we think about our children, do we see the abortion culture mindset creeping in?  Do we find that we are resenting our children because they ask a lot of us?  Are we preoccupied with all of things that we would rather be doing?  Do we often view our kids as a nuisance?   Do we dream of what life would be like without kids?

Do we feel defeated every morning before our feet even hit the floor?

Are we only giving part of ourselves to our children?

Do we hold back because we are sure we are ruining our children?

Do we often wish that our children would just leave us alone?

I would submit to you, my sweet mama friends, that these feelings are directly related to the abortion culture which has lied to us for our entire lifetime.  We must stop now and implore God to change our thinking about our children.

These lies have convinced women that some aren’t capable of being good mothers.  

These lies have convinced women that there are more important or fulfilling things than raising children.

These lies have convinced women that children are annoying, inferior, unimportant.

These lies have convinced women that children don’t have feelings or worth.

And, it shows  in the things we say about them on social media and in the way that we treat them.  It’s apparent in the huge number of mommy blogs that are  funny diaries of how miserable motherhood is.  With names like Scary Mommy, Bad Mommy, and My Name’s Not Mommy, these blogs have made it fashionable to hate the responsibility of raising children.   

And, the underlying current of all of it is:  what if I had never had children?  Would I be happier?

Before the abortion culture turned motherhood on its head, children were considered a source of great happiness.  Now, they are considered nothing more than dream squashers.

I’m convinced we need to examine our hearts and admit that the abortion culture has tainted our thinking.  For our kids’ sakes, and so we won’t pass on the lies to our little girls, let’s ask God to change our mindset.  Our children are so much more than an “issue.”  They are so much more significant than a choice.  And they need mothers who refuse to see them as obstacles to happiness.

Abortion Stigma: Emily Letts and the Mark Left Behind

Abortion rights activists have begun a new campaign, one that is designed to erase the negative social “stigma” associated with abortion.  As part of the push, the Abortion Care Network sponsored a “Stigma Busting Video Competition,” and I’m sure by now you have already seen one result of that competition:  Emily Letts’ bizarre video of her abortion procedure.  Emily, who says she was inspired to become an “abortion doula,” says that she wanted to do the video to help women get over the guilt that “our society breeds.”

I don’t entirely blame Emily for her distorted view of where abortion guilt is coming from.  After all, she is only a pawn, albeit a fully knowledgeable and intelligent pawn, being used by the abortion industry.  She is trying to be brave, and she probably believes in some ways that she is helping women.  Yet, her speeches on the video aren’t very convincing proofs that abortion is easy or that you aren’t filled with immense regret when it is finished.  The activists are weakly trying to use her video to inspire more abortions, but I doubt that it is having the desired effect.  Emily seems sad, withdrawn, and sullen, even though she is saying some of the right things.

I’m afraid poor Emily is finding out first hand that the social stigma that her video claims to fight against is the least of her worries.  Emily and other deceived women who were told it was no big deal, that they aren’t ready for children, that they can’t handle this baby, are now plagued with a different kind of stigma.  You see, stigma has another meaning.  It can mean, simply, a mark.

So, these women move on with their lives, and they have no stretch marks to show for their pregnancies.  They have no sagging breasts or widened hips.  They have no squishy bellies that say that they once carried a living being inside of them.  But, they are marked.  They live with the knowledge of a baby that should have been.  And, they carry the heavy burden of guilt and remorse, even if they do feel relief that they didn’t have the baby.  The stigma that marks their spirits–mothers’ spirits–can’t be erased by thoughtful videos or enlightened-sounding conversations about abortion in Cosmo.

In fact, the spiritual stigma that wears on them and wears them out and seems everywhere is much, much harder to live with than the social stigma.  Because no voice of reason can truly make it go away.  No amount of loud postulating or quiet offerings of this-was-right-for-me can make it disappear.  It is real, and heavy, and immovable.

But, there is one who can cover the stigma on broken mama spirits.  And, He has a stigma or two of his own.  His hands and feet are marked with scars that say that no dark spot on a human soul need remain.  His marks whisper love to the Emilys of the world.

Jesus, the stigma bearer, the only hope for any of us.

What Does the Christian Say?

I’m sure by now all of you have seen the viral YouTube video called “What Does the Fox Say?” (Watch it here.)  It’s a funny, weird little music video all about how the average person really doesn’t know what kind of sounds a fox makes.   When you’re reading a picture book to your baby, you tell her that the cat says meow and the doggie says ruff, but what do you do when you get to the picture of the fox?  It really is a dilemma.  (Another tough one is the bunny.  I always just say boing, boing.)

I guess the question will live on, because somehow I never did just Google it to try to find out what a fox actually says.  And the huge hole will remain in my book-reading repertoire.  Sorry, kids.

My nephew Pearson adores this video and thinks it’s hilarious.  He even went dressed as a fox for Halloween, wearing a sign that said, Ask me what I say.  Apparently people asked him all night and he made a bunch of the funny noises from the song.  What a cutie.

When I saw that big green sign on Pearson at Halloween, I imagined what would happen if Christians wore signs like that around.  What if we went to work, to Target, to the car wash, to the movies wearing a sign that said, I’m a Christian!  Ask me what I say!

Do you think it would change the daily message that we send to the world?  Do you think if we labeled ourselves and invited people to look to us as examples of how Christians talk that it would affect the way we present ourselves?

I do.

But, guess what?  We don’t have to wear a label around.  If we are Christians, people are already watching us to see how we talk.  They’re looking at us to see what kinds of things matter to us, what fills our minds and our hearts.  They’re listening to try and hear with their own ears what a life changed by Jesus Christ sounds like.

What kind of messages are we sending?  That believing in Jesus makes us over-sensitive?  That following God makes us cranky and hard to deal with?  That Christians are complainers?  That our faith makes no difference in the way we treat others?  In the way we deal with hardship?

We must be careful how we talk online, in person, and in attitudes and actions.  What we say and do should be softened with love, tempered with grace, and given to the world as a gift from God.

Also, let’s not forget, in light of the 41st anniversary of the horrible Roe v. Wade decision, that sometimes Christians remain silent when we shouldn’t.  God gives us opportunities to speak up for the weak.  Let’s not squander those chances.

So, when we have trouble using our words to bring glory to God, we can picture our big green sign, and we can remember the reality that our words matter, to the here and now and to eternity.

As for that sneaky fox, maybe one of these days I’ll try and figure out what he actually says.  In the meantime, I’ll continue my strategy of casually skipping the fox page in the picture books.  If Emerald ever asks about it, thank goodness Pearson is only a phone call away.

 

 

 

 

Child Sacrifice in America

Disclaimer:  The anger in this article is directed at the abortion industry and the legislators who refuse to shut it down.  The anger is not for the women who have been victims of this industry.  If you have had an abortion, there is forgiveness and healing in Jesus Christ, and there is support in your local church.

I want to tell you a horror story. Many, many lifetimes ago, a people lived on this earth called the Amorites. They were a dark and sick people. Imagine with me that this morning dawned bright and cool in an Amorite city just as a beautiful, dark-haired angel of a baby boy entered the world. He cried as babies do when they leave the warm embrace of their mother’s womb. But, instead of being quickly wrapped in a warm blanket and placed in his mother’s eager arms, someone lifted him by one ankle and carried him, startled baby boy, cold and disoriented and hurting, outside, into the bright sunlight, into the cold morning air. He hung there, naked and crying and being shaken violently by the person who carried him so carelessly, so meanly. Soon they approached a large roaring fire, prepared and waiting. And, with little ceremony, the baby boy was thrown into the fire. People watched as he squirmed and squealed and made noises that didn’t even seem possible, trying in his instinctual way to escape the agony of his burning flesh. And, no one cried. And, no one felt much of anything. It was simply something that had to be done.

After a few moments, the baby stopped squirming. He stopped making the terrifying noises. He lay still and melted away on a pile of rotted wood and ash. And later someone gathered up whatever wasn’t burned away and threw it outside of the city, where they forgot about it.

It is believed that scenes like this one happened repeatedly during the history of this evil people, the Amorites, and we are disgusted when we read about it. Every part of the humanity inside of us cries out in protest as we think of this precious one, and others like him, being burned alive and left for dead by the very adults who should be protecting him. Whatever the reason behind this practice, we would never be able to say, Well, in that case, it’s okay. Burning babies alive is necessary in some instances. No, we would never, could never, ever say that. Because we know, no matter when or how or where or why, burning people, especially babies, until they are dead is inherently wrong and evil and unforgiveable.

Fast forward many, many years. The year is 2014. In the past twelve months, over a million babies have been sacrificed in similar ways, many burned alive by a harmless sounding solution called saline. Somehow it seems so much easier to condemn the Amorites for their evil practices than to condemn us for ours. Yet, here we are, the by-standers. The people who go about our daily routines, knowing that helpless human babies are being carelessly yanked from their mothers’ wombs and thrown into the fire, where they melt into mere waste and are thrown out with the garbage.

The reasons, they seem important.  They almost seem legitimate until we remember, precious baby, round and healthy, the pulling, the shaking, the squirming, the agony.  The melting away of a human soul into a pile of trash, nothing more, and everyone goes home and has dinner and watches TV.

And in this we condemn ourselves.  Turns out we are no better than the wicked and evil and brutal Amorites.  We are committing sins that will call for such a reckoning.  I’m not sure if we can withstand the judgment.  And millions and millions of children, who would’ve been adults, who would’ve been who knows what, who would’ve mattered to the world, are crying out from their dumpster graves for justice.

But, we just can’t seem to stay focused.  Not when it’s so difficult to think about.  Not when it seems far removed from our church pews.

Not when people deserve choices.

I wonder if that little Amorite baby would choose the warmth of his mother’s arms over excruciating death by fire?  I wonder.

Murder is easy.  We look at it, and we say what a shame and we tsk, tsk and justify and justify and justify.  And, somehow we think ourselves better than the ignorant ancients who threw their babies on the fire to appease some non-existent god.

But, we’re not.  Not at all, actually.

At least the Amorites were trying to please a make-believe God.  We are only trying to please ourselves.

And we keep kindling the fire.

Satan in the Capitol

Last night at the Capitol in Austin, apparently some pro-choice protesters were chanting “Hail Satan.” As Christians, our immediate reaction is anger, disgust, and annoyance. But, I think there should be more to our response than that, for several reasons.

First of all, the protesters were not actually trying to hail or honor Satan. Whether they actually did honor him is another matter, but that was not their intent. In fact, most of the people who were chanting the phrase probably don’t even believe in Satan. They don’t believe the Bible, and they probably don’t have any kind of concrete belief in the God of the Bible.

They were making fun of us. Pure and simple.

In particular, in the video I saw, they were making fun of a pro-life group that was singing a rousing version of “Amazing Grace” in the middle of the room. The pro-lifers were standing together in the center of the room, hands raised, eyes closed in a posture of worship, and they were singing. Now, I’m sure there are lots of different opinions about the decision to sing hymns. I’m not there, so I can only speculate that the atmosphere there is scary and disturbing, and perhaps they’re singing in order to stay focused and calm their own nerves. I’m not sure if the hymn singing is the best protesting strategy, but, hey, some of them have been there all day and are probably about protested out.

So, while the pro-lifers are singing, the pro-choicers are chanting. One group singing to the Giver of Life and the other jokingly calling out to the Father of Lies.

Insert every ironic aspect of this scenario here.

While we want to be angry at the chanters (for a variety of reasons), we would be wise to take several steps back and look at the truth of the situation. Our hearts should actually be swelling with compassion for a group of people who is so convinced that Satan doesn’t exist that they would laughingly call out to him with no fear or sense of reverence for the God whom Satan hates. I would argue that it is not our job to be angry with them about this. After all, if it weren’t for God’s grace, I could easily be one of them, deceived by the one they called out to last night, unknowingly helping him steal, kill, and destroy.

The world hates God. It is so broken and out of whack and loves all the things that God hates. Isaiah said, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” This is the essence of what the mostly wonderful, kind, and caring people who are pro-choice are doing. They believe they are fighting for good. They have been deceived by the original Liar. They are lost, and they need a Savior, even though they don’t know it. This should break our hearts more than make us angry.

So, let’s not be offended by the chanters, but have compassion for them. Their chanting does nothing to hurt us, even though they are making fun. Jesus told us this would happen, so it’s really no shock that they believe we are foolish. Our job is love the lost and love God. Rather than wishing God’s vengeance on people like the chanters, we should be praying for His mercy in their lives and ours. We are all sinners. We should spend more time praising Him for rescuing us than getting our feathers ruffled over the opinions of people who don’t know Him.

We should pray. We should love. But, we shouldn’t be mad. They have a real enemy, and he can do so much damage in their lives because they don’t even believe he is there. Why would we be bitter toward them? Our hearts should be broken instead.

The Sweet Life

It’s no wonder that my generation of women is struggling with its identity. I was born in 1977, when the Baby Boomers were trying out their hippie ideologies on a whole world full of unsuspecting children. Some of them were clinging to a culture that said love cures all ills and drugs are a doorway to a world of spiritual wisdom. Some of them were figuring out how to get rich and how to have bigger houses and fewer children and more fun. Some of them, like my amazing parents, were sensible, godly examples in a crazy world that seemed schizophrenic in its values and ideals.

One thing that I was taught while growing up was the importance of being sweet. Many of you had the same experience. Girls should be sweet and kind, not loud or rude, they told us. After all, “Sugar and spice and everything nice”– isn’t that what little girls are made of?

Then we grew up and we were told that everything we had learned about being sweet was wrong. Being sweet, they said, is being an inferior version of yourself. You must be assertive. You must be loud. Nice gets you nowhere. In fact, they told us that nothing and no one should stand in the way of our dreams and goals. It got so bad that they even told us that pregnancy was a horrible inconvenience, easily “fixed” by a minor surgery. Children, after all, would only impede our progress. We would be moving backward if we gave up careers for families. We would be slapping the faces of all of the women through the years who had scratched and clawed and sacrificed to earn us these wonderful rights that allow us to discard our children. That allow us to hate other women. That allow us to divorce unworthy men. That allow us to be heartless and cutting and selfish and cruel. That allow us to get away with being mean in the name of womanhood.

After awhile I began to grow tired of this new message. I wondered why the only acceptable mode of femininity was markedly masculine, only much, much meaner. And, I wondered when “sweet” became a dirty word in our culture.

There is no question where Christians should land on the issue of sweetness. It should be one of the foremost qualities of Christian people. Think of the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Imagine all of these qualities wrapped up in a fabulous package called Woman. Does she look anything like the raging, rude, biting, critical, bitter, selfish woman that the world has told us is the confident, successful girl of today? Yet, this sweet woman, this gentle and kind and good woman, she is well-loved. She is treasured by many. And she pleases God.

The sweet path is not the easy way, though. It is the road filled with self-sacrifice. It takes much more courage to live sweetly than not. Anyone can say the first horrible thing that pops into their mind. But, it takes a strong woman to speak kindness. Anyone can have a get-out-of-my-way attitude. Only a truly bold woman can stand aside and let others pass her. Anyone can be cruel to those who are weak. Only an honorable and confident woman wraps babies and children and the hurting and the lost in her strong arms and says, I will love you. I will be here for you. I will sacrifice for you.

So, let the men be all about snakes and snails and puppy dog tails. But, you. Woman. Be sweet. Be gentle. And God will grant you the desires of your heart. Have children or don’t. Marry or don’t. Be the hotshot head of a multi-million dollar corporation or be the chief nose-wiper in your home. But, whatever you do, do it sweetly. Meanness is overrated. And truthfully, it has led to some of the greatest sins our generation has committed.

All generations are known for something. What about ours? Will we be known for our ruthlessness? Or will we change the world with our sweetness? I think it’s time that we claim our identity.

Meanness is weakness. Be strong. Live sweetly. Please God.