Why I am blocking the doors of abortion clinics

When I was pregnant with my first child, and felt her moving, I had one of those dawn experiences. I saw the light – and the light showed me that the child in the womb is an autonomous human being. I knew this already, on an intellectual level, but the knowledge kind of sunk in during that first pregnancy. My child had her own biological rhythm, her own blood type, sex, and a unique set of genes.

We know, more than any other generation in the history of humanity, the reality of life in the womb. We have photos and movies of it. But, somehow, reverence for human life is slipping away from us.

I believe the primary reason for this is our willingness to dispose of these very young members of our human family. In Australia, statistics tell us that the lives of 100,000 preborn babies a year are terminated. If 100,000 other young Australians were killed in any other way every year, we would see it as a national emergency. But, largely, we consent to the killing because they are unwanted, and out of our sight.

When other sections of society are being cruelly oppressed they can complain and campaign to gather support. But the only lobby group the unborn have is us.

It seems to me that you can’t dehumanize the unborn child without implicating its parents, and especially its mother. If you’re saying her child is rubbish, then isn’t she, her humanity, also in a questionable state? We must see how degrading and destructive abortion is for her, and all of us as well. In no other circumstances, when a mother can’t cope with her child, would we offer to kill it for her. We could never believe that this would be a way to help out. Yet, in a bizarre twist, people supposedly being progressive and fighting for women’s rights do just this.

Many people have tried education, political lobbying, rallying, marching, writing, advertising – all sorts of means to get these messages across. But we are failing.

I believe we are failing because we are not acting in accordance with our beliefs -–we are not trying to rescue the children in a direct, and normal, way. If a child was in a burning building, we’d do a break and enter to rescue it. We would not think it was breaking the law – the higher purpose of saving someone’s life would override this. If a child was on the road, in the same way, we’d stop the traffic to save it. How can we expect people to think of the unborn as small humans if we don’t behave as if they are either?

And so, I come to the doors of our abortion clinics to proclaim the humanity of these babies, and to reclaim our humanity.

Although, ludicrously, it means leaving my own children in order to do so, I don’t believe I am doing them any favors if I stay with them and allow our society to grow into one with no regard for the preciousness and sanctity of human life.

Lastly, I am afraid – of the effects of my actions on my children and extended family, of disruption to my relationships, of being entirely misunderstood. But ultimately I prefer to put myself in God’s hands, and trust that all will be well in the end if we just do the right thing.

-Anne Rampa-