My sincere apologies for not posting the second installment of this chapter sooner.

If you missed Part One, please scroll down to read the beginning of the chapter excerpt from my newest book:
I CAN’T DO IT ALL.

Part Two:

AN UNDETECTED PLAGUE

The current statistics are frightening. By the year 2000, only twenty-seven years after the 1973 decision, more than forty-six million abortions had already been done, spawning a debilitating plague that is sweeping our nation—a sickness of heart and soul that is tearing apart marriages and families, eroding self-images, and altering generations.1 Like the rotting foundation of a beautiful home, it’s a plague that in many instances has gone undetected for years. Yet the gravity of the situation is cataclysmic, because now the foundations are cracking and the walls are tumbling down.

I am one in an estimated 43 percent of women who have had an abortion by age forty-five; almost half that group has aborted more than one baby. Abortion knows no boundaries—age, race, or socioeconomic status. Even religion makes little or no difference in whether or not a woman has had an abortion. It’s likely we all know someone who is post-abortive.

She could be the woman who sits beside you at Bible study, your child’s Sunday school teacher, or your best friend.

The lie that it was our choice and that we could comfortably get on with life afterwards is haunting a nation of brokenhearted women and men, believers and non-believers
alike.

More frightening for me, and what’s causing me to go to my knees in prayer more and more often, is the fact that our choice and that women are looking to me for answers. we could comfortably They connect with me, knowing that I understand. Because of my willingness get on
with life after- to talk openly about my abortions, they wards is haunting a feel safe with me. They know I won’t judge them.

Once ‘‘pro-choice,’’ I now think of myself as ‘‘poor choice’’ when it comes to the decisions I made in the past. Whether it was one abortion or more doesn’t matter—the number is irrelevant. What is relevant is that I bought into the lie the world placed on a silver platter and handed to me with great pomp and circumstance. At the time, I was an unbeliever. Christ did not play a part in any portion of my life. While this gives me some comfort today, my heart breaks for those women who do believe in the Almighty Creator and yet made an abortion decision based on worldly lies.

Even in the Church

Could abortion really exist inside the church? If so, why don’t we hear from more women and men who have found healing within the body? Why does silence still shroud this subject, making healing all the more difficult?

Could it be that instead of finding restoration in God’s kingdom, Christians touched by abortion are still living in secret guilt and shame, afraid to seek healing for the burden they carry? I’m sure many women ask themselves, Will I still be accepted if I tell? Will anyone understand?

Post-abortive women are not seeking approval for what they’ve done. Rather, they are seeking grace, unconditional love, and a release from the burden they’ve carried for years. Sharing the secret pain of abortion is a major step in healing.

In a survey conducted by Open Arms Ministry, 80 percent of post-abortive women reported problems with guilt, 70 percent reported depression, and 63 percent said they couldn’t forgive themselves. In other words, there’s a world of hurting women out there, trying to be daughters, sisters, wives, mothers, friends, and co-workers while harboring a dark secret that keeps them in bondage.

For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be rendered powerless, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. (Romans 6:6–7)

Return for more from the chapter: “It’s My Choice” from the book: I CAN’T DO IT ALL.