Authors: Abby Johnson,Cindy Lambert
Tags: #Non-Fiction, #Inspirational, #Biography, #Religion
We had no time for preparation. Lights were set up, the camera rolled, the reporter asked me to tell my story, and I simply answered her questions and recounted the events of the ultrasound-guided abortion and my decision to leave Planned Parenthood and come to the Coalition for Life. We expected it to air as a short piece on that night’s news report. I called my mom on my drive back home to tell her to turn on the news.
“Mom, I think I’m about to be on the news. But I doubt it will be a big story, probably just something quick at the end.” Mom turned on the TV while I talked with her.
After pulling into my driveway, I hurried into the house to tell Doug and watch it with him. I was walking in my front door, still talking to my mom, when the 10:00 p.m. news program began. My jaw dropped. We were the lead story! Doug and I shared looks of disbelief.
“This is wild, Doug! My leaving Planned Parenthood is breaking news?” I threw my head back and laughed. “They really need to find some bigger news here in Bryan!”
There on every screen tuned into KBTX, Shawn and I were shown sitting side by side, and in the short excerpts of the interview they showed, I said, after a recap of the story of participating in an ultrasound-guided abortion experience, “I just thought I can’t do this anymore, and it was just like a flash that hit me and I thought that’s it.”
Then I went on to say that I’d begun at Planned Parenthood, as many of my coworkers had, out of a sense of idealism and a desire to help women in crisis, but that it seemed to me the emphasis had shifted at the organization. “It seemed like maybe that’s not what a lot of people were believing anymore because that’s not where the money was. The money wasn’t in family planning, the money wasn’t in prevention, the money was in abortion, and so I had a problem with that.”
The station had, of course, also contacted Planned Parenthood for a response, and a spokesperson had issued a statement that the TV report included: “We regret being forced to turn to the courts to protect the safety and confidentiality of our clients and staff, however, in this instance it is absolutely necessary.”
15
I had no idea, that Sunday night, of the chain of events about to unfold, thanks to that one press release from Planned Parenthood. When I revisit this part of my journey, I have to confess I simply laugh aloud and celebrate how God works, because that Planned Parenthood press release opened a floodgate of media interest nationwide that accomplished the exact opposite of what Planned Parenthood had intended with this restraining order: It put my voice and the story of my change of heart as a result of that ultrasound-guided abortion before hundreds of thousands of people. It put that one experience of my moving from one side of the fence to the other at that clinic in Bryan, Texas, on October 5 into the national consciousness. You’re holding this book in your hand because Planned Parenthood issued a press release on October 30, 2009.
At least, that’s one way to look at it.
But the bigger story, the greater truth, is that you are holding this book in your hand because God is in the business of changing hearts and minds and using ordinary people for His extraordinary purposes. That night, when I saw what God had accomplished through the news story, the opening story no less, I found myself doing what Shawn Carney was no doubt doing that night—laughing with joy at what God was accomplishing.
As it turned out, I wasn’t formally served the court papers until Wednesday morning.
Early
Wednesday morning—7:00 a.m. I’d just gotten out of the shower and was in my fluffy white robe with my monogrammed initials when I heard banging, and I mean banging, on the door. I nearly skipped my way to the door, and there stood a uniformed officer with papers in hand.
“Good morning!” I said with a big smile. “I’ve been expecting you.” I remember sensing God’s timing and control with great confidence that Wednesday morning because I had already seen the contents by then and already met with our attorney, Jeff Paradowski. Jeff’s office had secured a copy from the court on that Monday morning and emailed it to me and to Shawn. It had looked very scary when I’d first read it all, but exercising my new practice of recognizing God at work, I tried not to be too intimidated by it until I’d talked with Jeff.
The worst part of reading the papers was that they confirmed my worst fears. Among the allegations, the petition made it clear—if I chose to believe what it said—that Megan and Taylor had not just turned against me but had apparently given false statements to the court. According to the legal documents filed, Megan told them that I had given her résumé to the Coalition for Life without her permission. I can’t express how badly that hurt.
But there in my bathrobe on Wednesday morning, face-to-face with an officer of the law who was holding out to me official documents whose contents I’d actually had since Monday, I was able to catch a glimpse of what God was up to.
The words I’d texted to Shawn on Friday night came back to mind.
The cat was indeed out of the bag.
And no one would be able to stuff it back in.
Chapter Twenty
The Red Carpet
Unplanned.
Everything about my journey since running out of the Planned Parenthood clinic into the waiting arms at the Coalition for Life house was unplanned—by me, I mean. I look back on the journey and see God’s fingerprints all over it, of course. If there is one seed I hope to plant in the heart of everyone who hears my story, it is this: God is worthy of our obedience and trust. When we step out in obedience, God rolls out the red carpet! That doesn’t mean the path will be easy, but it does mean that He has prepared it for us.
I took great comfort in Philippians 3:13-14:
Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
I had no doubt that “forgetting what is behind” was going to be a challenge. I felt the weight of the part I’d played in furthering Planned Parenthood’s agenda for so long, and I felt foolish and used for not seeing the truth sooner. But I also felt the rush of excitement that I was now running a race for God. I’d lunged forward on October 5, when I’d literally run from my office desk to the door at the Coalition for Life, uncertain what awaited me, but simply knowing it was where God was calling me to go. Now, just a few weeks later, having experienced the bright lights of the Sunday evening news camera and with the court hearing looming ahead, I became aware that this race had an audience, in spite of my attempts to keep it quiet. God had rolled this red carpet right into the public arena! And I have to confess that this part amused me to no end: He’d used Planned Parenthood’s own tactics to do so.
The Monday morning following the news broadcast telling of my change of heart and my decision to leave Planned Parenthood and join the Coalition for Life brought an avalanche of media attention. By early that morning, calls were pouring into the Coalition office at an overwhelming pace. And I don’t mean a few calls. Literally hundreds.
That morning, relieved that I no longer had to keep my relationship with the Coalition for Life a secret, I headed over to their office. I felt so free! For weeks I’d been longing to give back to them in some way. I was used to being busy and active, and the weeks of lying low had been difficult, even though I’d been treasuring the time with Grace. I arrived at the Coalition house at about 7:30 in the morning. Shawn, Bobby, and Karen were already there, talking about the newscast. I grabbed a mop and scrubbed some floors to make good use of the vibrant energy I felt. Shawn and I were scheduled to go to Jeff’s office later in the morning, so I had time to pitch in around the place.
At around 8:00, Heather walked in. She did a double take. “Abby, oh my word! You look so beautiful! I’ve never seen you like this!”
At first I thought she was teasing, since I was mopping the floor. Then I realized that she meant it.
“You are positively glowing! You look radiant.”
Karen, smiling, said, “You’re right! She’s not hiding anymore.”
And I knew what she meant—not just that my hiding these past two weeks was over, but that my spirit wasn’t in hiding anymore. I’d been freed up inside by God, released from hiding my soul in the guilt I’d privately been wrestling for so long. The joy I felt radiated from me.
They both hugged me.
And then the phone started to ring. Bobby answered the first call, and he’d no more than hung up before it rang again, and then it was like the entire place erupted. Between calls, they were grasping for paper to take more messages. Soon they started calling out things like, “It’s
The O’Reilly Factor
. They want an interview. What do I tell them?” and, “Laura Ingraham is on the line!” and “Fox News wants an interview!” and “Mike Huckabee wants you on his show! And you’re in the
Drudge Report
.”
News stations, both TV and radio, from across the country were calling. The faithful Coalition for Life staff got a crash course in new terminology: listener base, requests for exclusives. It was mind-boggling. It was exciting and fascinating. But it was also humbling. I felt so small compared to my God who is so big. I knew more than anyone that I was no hero. Just the opposite, in fact. I had blood on my hands for who-knows-how-many abortions, and I’d been paid for my work. The true heroes were working at the Coalition. They’d been walking the fence in 100-degree weather and ice storms. They’d been standing and praying for untold hours over weeks, months, and years. They’d been speaking words of care and concern through the bars of the fence while Planned Parenthood—while I—had maligned them and mocked them. Yet God was thrusting me into the spotlight. He had chosen to demonstrate, through me, that He redeems the foolish, the broken, the sinful, and then uses them to accomplish His purposes.
Media requests weren’t the only calls coming in. Women were contacting the Coalition for Life as well. Women who had experienced the pain of abortion themselves were calling in for counseling and to send their thanks to me for speaking out. They were telling of their guilt, remorse, and shame. They were insisting that my story was giving them hope that they could leave those things behind. Pregnant women were calling to say that, after hearing my news interview, they had decided not to abort. Women who’d visited Planned Parenthood clinics and had left determined never to return were calling to urge me to keep telling the truth. Clearly, my story had touched a nerve. God was reminding me that this wasn’t about me at all. It was about Him, His purposes, His story.
Not sure what else to do, I started taking calls and accepting interviews.
A couple of days later, Wednesday, I was heading into the Coalition house when Mr. Orozco, the faithful ex-policeman who never missed his stand-and-pray hours on Wednesdays and Saturdays, saw me. He rushed over. “Abby!” he cried with exuberant joy. “Oh, Abby, I have been praying for you for so many years. It is so good to see you on this side of the fence! What an answer to prayer you are!” He hugged me, and I hugged him back tightly. This kind man had been praying for me for years. God had answered his prayers. I had no words sufficient to express my gratitude.
I thought back to my conversation with Elizabeth just a few weeks before as she and I were having our first lunch together. I told her how often I’d thought of her and the friendship she had offered and how her card had sat on my desk for two years and played a pivotal role in my decision that day to run to the Coalition house. I also told her of troubling thoughts I had of guilt and remorse.
“Abby, I can’t believe how God answered our prayers for you. In such a bigger way than we’d ever dreamed! Who knew what would happen in His timing?”
“It’s hard to wrap my head around it all. Elizabeth, you’ve got so much more experience than I do at following God. I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed by it all, and I’m afraid I’ll mess up somehow.” I felt myself tearing up, suddenly aware that I longed for Elizabeth to mentor me.
“Abby, you’ve been through a dramatic change in a matter of just a few weeks.” Elizabeth spoke so gently that more tears started flowing. “It sounds to me like you are almost afraid to be still. But you must. God is working on you. You need to be quiet before Him and let His work take root.”
I hated to admit it, but she was right. I was afraid to sit still too long, afraid of the guilt that sometimes whispered to me in the early morning hours. I was afraid of silence. I just wanted to be busy for God until the past faded away.
I had done my best to take her advice over the past few weeks. I stayed home. And boy, was it quiet! I didn’t know what to do with myself. I cleaned the house top to bottom, cleaned out closets, played with Grace, fixed dinner for Doug, rented movies, and tried to rest. I prayed, prayed, and prayed some more. I read God’s Word. I stopped by the Coalition for Life office a few times, but only briefly, as I was nudged to leave by Shawn and the team. I practiced being still before God—a new discipline for me. It felt foreign at first, but Elizabeth urged me to keep working at it.
So until the night of learning of the temporary restraining order, October 30, I’d done just what she suggested. Now, hugging Mr. Orozco, I remembered that conversation, and it hit me that God, once again, had planned my path. I’d needed that time to rest. And now, with media requests pouring in left and right, there was no time to rest at all! Elizabeth continues to be a mentor to me. We still talk on the phone nearly every day. She keeps me grounded, she prays with me and for me, and she reminds me daily that God loves me. She is a gift from heaven.
I called her that same Wednesday afternoon.
“Abby! I hear the phones are ringing off the hook over there! Are you going to accept all those interviews?”
“How can I not? God’s the one rolling out the red carpet for me. The least I can do is walk where He leads, right?”
“It’s your time, girl! You go!”
Meanwhile, Jeff kept me posted on his preparation for the hearing. He kept asking if there could be anything I might have forgotten to tell him, anything at all that would explain why Planned Parenthood would be willing to go to court for what was obviously, to him, a meritless case. I wracked my brain but could think of nothing. He and Shawn were reviewing everything they could think of that might give cause for Planned Parenthood to have named them as codefendants in the case, but like me, they came up empty-handed.
Shawn and Jeff weren’t the only ones who were busy. The Coalition for Life team was still taking countless calls from media, but now they were referring them to a speaker’s bureau, which, at Shawn’s suggestion, I’d contracted to handle media requests for me. What a relief! They were experts at handling such inquiries, and we were all glad to shed that role. My calendar was filling up.
But others were busy as well—bloggers. Prochoice and pro-life bloggers were having a field day over me. Accusations of conspiracies sprang up on both sides. Some claimed I’d been a mole for pro-lifers all along and intentionally spent eight years undercover to try to discredit Planned Parenthood. Others claimed my defection from Planned Parenthood was nothing more than a ruse, that I was just an unhappy employee who faked repentance in order to win media attention and speaking engagements. Some claimed that there had been no ultrasound-guided abortion, that I’d simply fabricated the story. At first I read them and gasped, ranted, and wept over the blogs. But within a few days I was able to take it in stride. God’s path was before me, and I knew the truth, as did the people in my life who mattered. I couldn’t control or even influence the rhetoric, so I prayed for God’s grace to let it be. At least it kept me praying! And I was realizing daily how important it was for me to spend time with God one-on-one.
My Facebook and e-mail were overflowing as well, averaging upward of two hundred e-mails a day, almost all of which were either from women in crisis who appreciated my speaking the truth or old friends cheering me on for leaving Planned Parenthood and speaking out. I felt I owed them each a reply and would often be up until 1:00 a.m. writing personal responses to each of them.
Perhaps the saddest fallout from the media attention and blogging came from a direction I least expected: members of my own church. Doug and I had been attending for nearly two years now. This was, in fact, the first mainline denominational liturgical church we’d ever attended. The denomination took a prochoice stance, no doubt one reason I’d felt comfortable giving the congregation a try after a previous church, which we had loved, had denied me membership given my job at Planned Parenthood. That had been a painful time for me, and when we began attending our current church, after Grace’s birth, I’d been deeply moved by the confession of faith that was part of each service. In fact, I recognized now that the weekly recital of the prayer of confession in the liturgy had been instrumental in my wrestling with God over my role at Planned Parenthood.
Now I began receiving e-mails from members of our new church. A few from my congregation cheered me on. But others were very angry. They reminded me that our church was prochoice, and more than one suggested I no longer worship there.
One Sunday after a media interview, a few friends came up to me, saying, “You did great.” But a couple of people seemed standoffish. That’s when I began to discover both the good and bad consequences of taking a stand, particularly one made public in such a visible way.
One fellow parishioner—a good friend—sent me an e-mail she’d written in what seemed to me a very cold tone. She said that even though it might appear that many members of my church supported my decision, in truth they did not. And she reminded me that the Episcopal Church—the denomination to which our church belonged—was prochoice, not pro-life.
I replied, trying to explain myself, and she replied, but we made no headway on resolving the tension between us. I must admit I was feeling somewhat under attack at this point. It wasn’t just the hostility I felt from my former colleagues at Planned Parenthood—now I was feeling resistance and disapproval from some of my church friends.
I was heartbroken. How ironic, I thought. When I was prochoice, my pro-life church wouldn’t accept me for membership. Now that I was pro-life, fellow parishioners who were prochoice were withdrawing their fellowship from me. While I acknowledge the right of any church to stand behind its beliefs, I struggle with how that happened in these two instances. I don’t have a perfect solution to offer; I can only speak to how these incidents affected me—and how I suspect similar incidents likely affect others like me, or at least like the Abby I used to be.
When the first church bluntly and somewhat awkwardly told me I could not become a member, the church lost any opportunity to influence my outlook. I wish they had offered to dialogue with me about why they were so committed to their pro-life position and why they found my work at the clinic such an obstacle to my becoming a member. Or at the very least, I wish they would have expressed care for me apart from my prochoice position. Now some members in the second church were making me feel as if I wasn’t even welcome in the building. A few went so far as to suggest that I leave.