Pro-lifers make the honest choice

By Lisa Bourne

Mrs. Lisa Bourne and family

It’s interesting that almost without exception those who don the term, “pro-choice,” to describe their position on the life issue, have a problem with the idea of an informed choice for women when the possibility of prenatal ultrasound is raised.

Why is, “choice” only valid when it’s one they espouse?

The term, “pro-choice” is a dishonest one. Pro-lifers need to stop conceding the language and insist upon calling things what they are.

Where’s the choice?

Would losing one’s life to abortion be the choice of any unborn child? No.

If a mother really has a choice, (and for the further purpose of utilizing honest terms, we must in fact say, “mother,”) once pregnant, you are a mother, and, maternity is forever.

Saying, “the woman,” in referring to a pregnant mother is deliberate language used to dehumanize the unborn child alive within her. So if a mother really feels she has a choice, would she choose to end the life of her unborn child? I think not.

Would the fathers, grandparents, or any other relatives affected when an abortion is committed, really choose to end the lives of their own flesh and blood?

They shouldn’t. So many are heartbroken when that “choice” is made.

Sadly, too often it is the case where mothers are pressured into agreeing to have the lives of their unborn children taken, pressured by someone close to them because that someone isn’t up to welcoming the life, or they have something to gain by the mother not choosing life. Or she is lacking the support she needs to know she can be the mother to the child God gave her.  This dynamic can happen because it is entangled in denial of the humanity of the unborn child whose life is at stake.

Where’s the choice in that for anyone?

Pretty well non-existent.

Would abortionists choose to peddle their largely unregulated procedures for profit under the faux guise of “women’s reproductive health,” and choose to fight vehemently when they perceive a threat to their profit?

You bet.

Follow the money.

Really, I think the most authentic choice of all is that of pro-life supporters.

They choose to pray, not protest, pray (remember, word choice matters). They choose to pray at Planned Parenthood and other abortion facilities year round and especially during the semi-annual 40 Days for Life prayer, fasting and outreach vigil.

They choose to volunteer tirelessly at crisis pregnancy centers and pro-life medical clinics. They volunteer for wonderful life-giving programs like the Gabriel Project, Birthright, Agape, Illumination Media, Ruth Harbor, Gabriel’s Corner, the Iowa Right to Life Committee and Iowans for L.I.F.E., among countless others.

Pro-lifers choose to contribute their personal resources in addition to their time, for mothers, their unborn children and families, to these programs and more. They choose to work continually to encourage others to do the same by inviting their support for these programs and conducting outreach through their churches and other groups.

They choose to buy diapers and onesies, to volunteer to give pregnancy tests, to knit baby booties and to collect change in baby bottles, and they choose to hope it could make a difference in someone’s life.

Pro-life supporters choose to contact their legislators when the time comes to support laws that foster the defense of life.

They choose to be courageous and speak up when religious institutions honor public figures that support abortion in conflict with the sanctity of life.

They choose to do these because it is their God-given right and duty to do so.

The annual March for Life in Washington D.C.

Pro-lifers choose by the hundreds of thousands to stand up and witness each year to God’s precious gift of life at the March for Life in Washington D.C., even as this massive public witness is on the whole ignored or ridiculed by most media.

And they choose to stand in great numbers for life locally across the nation and Canada at the annual Life Chain.

Pro-life supporters choose to stand up for life even though it gets them falsely branded as judgmental, hate-mongers, clinic bombers, radicals who do nothing but stand in the street with signs, and single-issue voters who only care about the baby, not about anyone’s care after a child’s birth.

Pro-lifers choose to support the sanctity of life despite the cost to them and their families, and choose to do so in spite of the fact that there’s no material profit in it.

The Life Chain

Would abortionists choose to feign such concern over women’s’ “reproductive health” if there were no financial profit in it for them?

Would you choose to believe their answer if they told you?

Those who are pro-life choose to fight for life, because they know every life is precious and that life is God’s gift.

Even though it’s unpopular they choose to embrace and defend truth.

Given this, pro-lifers choose to reject the nonsense of, “safe, rare and legal,” and, “Well I’m personally opposed to abortion, but I can’t tell someone else how to live their life.”

Rather, they choose to work and pray for changed hearts, common sense, and one day, abortion rendered obsolete.

Providing a mother a medically accurate image of the God-given child within her is one step in the right direction to acknowledging truth and saving lives, not just the baby’s, the mother’s as well.

[Lisa Bourne is a Catholic, wife, and mother of five. She is pictured above with her husband, Chris, and their three earthly children.]

4 Comments

  1. Tom Maly on March 1, 2012 at 3:37 pm

    Great writing, Lisa! Thanks for all you do to honor life! The Knights of Columbus are tireless warriors as well. God bless your efforts and their’s.



  2. Rhonda Phillips on March 1, 2012 at 5:58 pm

    Standing O..cheering, applause! Brilliant, logical, sweet and direct. The pro-life movment is changing hearts and minds. Improvements in ultrasound is making it clear that the baby inside a mother’s womb is not a blob of tissue. We have nothing financial to gain by saving the lives of unborn babies. Frankly, were we endowed with the Federal and State funding granted to the abortion industry we could go much farther in really helping mother’s with an unplanned pregnancy. Mother’s deserve better than being pursuaded the only option they have is that of killing their unborn offspring.

    Thanks Lisa for another lesson on ‘word games’ played by the abortion industry. I always learn something from you.



  3. maxine Bechtel on March 2, 2012 at 7:48 am

    BRAVO, LISA! You’ve hit the proverbial nail on the head! very litte else needs to be said! Those who CLAIM to be Pro-“choice” only “Choose” death to their doomed babies, who have NO choice! ADDITIONALLY, they selfishly choose convenience and freedom from the responsibility of their actions in murdering the fruit of their actions.



  4. Roger Rowland on March 2, 2012 at 3:44 pm

    Lisa – What a wonderful article! The pro-life mindset has much to speak for it, whereas the pro-death mindset (yes…words have meaning!) is unfathomable. It is unbelievable that a person can be so totally self-centered that they would be willing to kill (words have meaning!) their own child. Thank you for sharing this thoughtful article with us.