Then we went to another friend's house and she had the book sitting on her bookshelf and she offered to let me bring it home and read it. I started it at 11 pm last night and shut the back cover at 1:30 am--I just couldn't put it down.
To quickly summarize the storyline, Abby started volunteering at Planned Parenthood in college in an effort to help women. This led to her employment and eventual promotion to director of the clinic where she had chosen a second abortion of her own. As she interacted with pro-life demonstrators and contrasted their love with the progressively profit-driven Planned Parenthood, she eventually not only resigned from Planned Parenthood but started volunteering with the Coalition for Life and now travels all over the United States sharing her pro life message. The climax of her story took place when she assisted in an ultrasound-guided abortion and watched the baby trying to move away from the probe as he was sucked into the vacuum.
I think part of what made Abby's story so compelling to me is my desire to teach my children to be able to think, to analyze arguments for their logic or fallacies, and approach life from a biblical worldview. Abby's story is a good illustration of a young woman not being grounded in a biblical worldview or owning an ability to discern truth from lies.
You see, Abby was swayed as a college student by the Planned Parenthood rhetoric of empowering women and reducing the number of abortions with birth control. As she progressed along her career path, she swallowed their "talking points" and parroted them back at the clients and media. Others in her life, including her parents and her husband, saw through the rhetoric but she just wasn't discerning. I want to prepare my children to think through what someone else says, to recognize fallacies in reasoning, and especially to *know* the Truth so well that they simply will not buy into a pack of lies, no matter how prettily packaged.
There are two other points in this book I would love to sit down and chat out with a friend. I was saddened again by the lack of unity among professing Christians on this issue and appalled that one church would be categorized as "pro-life" while another is "pro-choice". No wonder we are here, folks!
I also appreciated the reminder that we are all human, we all make mistakes, we are all susceptible to being misled. I liked her representation that not all abortionists are necessarily evil people looking forward to killing babies. We have an enemy--and it's not the people who are misled and being used by him. Abby Johnson is a great example of someone who was influenced by the love of the Lord which led to repentance and her story inspires me to share that love with others while trusting the Lord to bring about fruit.
(And as a totally irrelevant aside, have you noticed how many books being with the prefix "un"? Unbroken, Unglued, Uncompromising, Unplanned. . .)
That is on my bucket list of books to read! We heard Abby speak in person at a New Life Family Services fundraiser/banquet last October. Dynamite speaker.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, have you read Uncommon, by Coach Tony Dungy?! EXCELLENT book!
I would love to hear her speak too! And no, I haven't read Uncommon, but thanks for the recommendation--glad my aside prompted an "excellent" recommendation! :)
DeleteI read this book last year and was fascinated by it! I found it an awesome read and it really made me consider things like am I equipping my kids to make decisions rooted in their faith because they know that faith well enough or just because they are making those decisions for me and therefore might choose differently once they move out.
ReplyDeleteYes! It's pretty obvious we are in the same season of life, hmmm? :)
DeleteLoved hearing your thoughts on this one too. It is a really incredible book, telling a really incredible story. And you are right - it is SO important to teach our children to think and discern accurately and well.
ReplyDelete