Meet Melissa Ohden. Ohden survived an abortion in 1977. She’s a person pro-choice activists want to ignore. Pro-choice activists say they care about human rights. But what about Ohden? Can you look her in the eye and say she shouldn’t exist?
Ohden and 13 other abortion survivors ask this piercing question in a new, powerful ad that debuted yesterday at the March for Life after Ohden’s keynote address. Featured in the ad are abortion survivors Dr. Imre Téglásy (1952, Hungary); Paula Page (02/24/54); Miriam “Penny” Hopper (11/29/55); Denisha Workizer (7/11/76); Melissa Ohden (8/29/77); Jennifer Millbourn (9/02/78); Jennifer Callender (7/18/80); Claire Culwell (3/06/88); Hope Hoffman (8/12/91); Josiah Presley (10/07/95); Asiimwe Ronald Williams (9/25/97, Uganda); Dona Marie Mendoza (Philippines); Jaylin Schoch (8/15/03); and Zechariah Hagan (10/20/13), who was one of the first abortion pill reversal survivors.
The ad is incredibly powerful, and highlights a sad reality of which few Americans are aware. I wish every American would watch this ad and share with their neighbors.
For the past 8 years, Ohden has been connecting and supporting other abortion survivors through her organization called The Abortion Survivors Network. Today, in conjunction with the release of the abortion survivor ad, a new organization is launching called Faces of Choice, bringing awareness to the abortion survivor issue.
[pullquote]”Abortion advocates need to look these survivors in the eye and come to terms with the fact that they are human, that their lives matter, and that choice is more than a word: it’s a person.”[/pullquote]”We can’t think of a more important time to come together and challenge the world to face the ‘choice’ of abortion and encourage people to ultimately find healing and create a culture of life,” Ohden said. Similarly, Lyric Gillett, the executive director of Faces of Choice, added, “I am convinced that the key to changing the cultural conversation about abortion is within the voices of the survivors. The idea behind this initiative is that every great civil rights or humanitarian movement of our era has had an actual face of a survivor attached to it, giving it meaning outside of a nebulous concept. . . . Abortion advocates need to look these survivors in the eye and come to terms with the fact that they are human, that their lives matter, and that choice is more than a word: it’s a person.”Your tax-deductible gift helps our journalists report the truth and hold Christian leaders and organizations accountable. Give a gift of $30 or more to The Roys Report this month, and you will receive a copy of “Hurt and Healed by the Church” by Ryan George. To donate, click here.
I’m excited that Ohden will be joining me for an upcoming The Roys Report podcast. Stay tuned for more information on that. In the meantime, please share this ad widely, and also pray for its distribution. The team that produced it worked for months to have a shorter version of it play during the 2020 Super Bowl, but the network stonewalled. The team is currently in talks with other networks and outlets, so let’s pray God opens doors!
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4 Responses
God cares about both the mother and the baby. Some focus solely on the mother as if the baby did not exist. Others focus solely on the baby as if the mother did not exist. But God loves both the mother and the baby and Christians who care about following God need to be good neighbors to both the mother and the baby.
I was born an orphan in Portland, Maine. I was against abortion when I was young. Saving lives in the operating room changed me into a woman who now believes that women should have a choice. Women are raped, have diseases, and some are homeless. If you ask a homeless person who is pregnant why they are homeless, women will tell you. They need help. Feed them, give them a home, and let them keep their baby. Don’t take it away and offer it up for adoption, so that child can be sold, or molested. It is time for the world to listens to the orphans. We have a voice. I pray as I always have to the great spirit, my ”God”. I was born an American here in my land. Where my people existed long before the white man demagog brought harm to our people. Educate yourselves because history is a cruel teacher! Let’s feed the children we have. They are homeless! There are children hungry, lonely and freezing to death all over the work. ” Eugenics courses were taught at the University of Maine from about 1913 until about 1930” https://www.uvm.edu/~lkaelber/eugenics/ME/ME1.jpg
You make cogent and good points Theresa. Homeless women, and all women in a crisis need help and I do think there are already folks helping women in these dire crisis situations.
Look up “The Morning Center”.
But that “choice” you think women should have is a choice to murder a human being. The bigger question is, why are we in the place where a woman is being led to think the “best” is to murder a child?
I have seen a woman dejected and burdened and crying outside an abortion clinic because
she had had an abortion. She called it “murder”. And now she is dealing with that.
The true wickedness is that women of all races must suffer from this “choice”.
That is our shame and our tragedy.
We are all made in the image of God. God cares for us in ways beyond what we can imagine, (psalm 139)
Who is to say God would not look out for that child with a homeless parent?
And if adopted, why might not the child not go to a decent family? Open adoptions exist.
As for human trafficking, where I live, I’ve heard it is whites who give their children into human trafficking vs. the other races. It’s all wicked.
So do non profits that help homeless mothers. And mothers in abusive situations. The call to Christians is, are you doing something to help?
We’re considering doing foster care. Respite for now.
I am not naive to the wickedness of men. It’s in my history. My ancestors were killed in a genocide in the 20th century. My grandfather, an orphan, survived. He was taken into an orphanage. It is because he lived, 20+ of us are here today. And we are alive.
Going back further, I believe the story of Jonah is true, I am Assyrian, Nineveh is our ancestral city. We were wicked! But we repented when Jonah preached. And 1000s of Assyrians are alive today because of God’s mercy.
“God don’t make no junk”.
I’m not junk, you’re not junk, those mothers are not junk, no one is.
We are all valued and precious by Abba Father.
That is why I am for Life, not a lie called “choice”.
I am for the True Choice of Life. Because My Father made those lives.
And I want to Help Him.
Show us how. Amen.
Edit, correction! This is how the paragraph after “it’s all wickedness” should read.
There are shelters and non profits that help homeless mothers. And mothers in abusive situations. The call to Christians is, are you doing something to help?