The following letter by L. E. Roseman of Grand Prairie appeared in The Dallas Morning News on November 9, 1996 (30A).
Please let me speak for those of us who have had abortions-and never ever had regrets! Yes, I’ve had two such experiences. The reasons are my own. No one owns my body, but God and me. And, yes, I am and was, in “his care” (still am!).
I never have felt guilt-nor lost one night’s sleep over my decisions. Thank God I had a choice-even though I had to go to a quack doctor (wasn’t legal then) and nearly died from it (or could have).
Someone should tell this individual that a lack of sensitivity and a clear conscience are not equals. There are many people who perform equally heinous acts who never waste time accusing themselves of wrongdoing. What about the two Delaware teenagers who delivered her baby and then killed it? The headline in the Denton Record-Chronicle says “‘Good Kids’ Face Murder Charge” (5A, 11-19-96). Good kids? Have we sunk so low in society that we now call those who have just murdered an innocent, helpless child “good”?
But perhaps they were just confused. Maybe they reasoned that “we could have aborted this baby just a few months ago; what’s the difference between born and unborn?” Or maybe they thought, “We could have obtained a partial birth abortion just a few days ago; what’s the difference in a couple of days? After all, if babies are killed in the womb and during the birth process, nobody should care if we wait until after the birth to kill the unwanted child.” Whatever their thinking (or lack of it), they certainly saw nothing wrong in their actions. They may regret, however, being found out.
November’s Reader’s Digest contains an article entitled “Ticket to a Murder,” in which there can be no doubt as to the “no regrets” philosophy. Four young men entered a convenience store and brutally beat one woman to death; the other one lived to identify them. After being convicted of aggravated murder and sentenced to death Michael Hayward commented: “If I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t change anything. Her life, or any other person’s life, means nothing to me” (36).
The fact that somebody may experience “no regrets” over a sin, a crime, even a heinous crime, proves nothing. The Bible speaks about those who have “seared their consciences” (1 Tim. 4:2) and are “past feeling” (Eph. 4:19). Not feeling any sense of remorse for one’s actions in no way means that those actions were correct. Many people excuse themselves for their actions because otherwise they could not cope with themselves.
The letter-writer has deluded herself in thinking that God approves of her actions. Her approach apparently is, “If I feel good about what I did, then God will, too.” The only way we know what God thinks is to go by the standard that He sets forth in the Bible. We cannot subjectively decide that He approves of whatever we decide to do. “You thought that I was altogether like you” (Ps. 50:21).
God regards the unborn child as a baby (Luke 1:41, 44 and 2:12, 16). She killed a human being made in the image of God. She did not just have a part of her body removed; she took the life of a body within her-but separate from hers (in many fundamental ways).
The first prerequisite of forgiveness (certainly a condition of being in God’s care) is repentance. Before a person can repent, however, he (or she) must recognize that she has sinned. This woman has never acknowledged that point. She murdered two of her own children by abortion, has never felt any guilt, and continues to be proud of what she did. Without recognition of wrongdoing, there can be no repentance; without repentance, there can be no forgiveness; without forgiveness there can be no reconciliation to God. This person is therefore lost.
Furthermore, she has no respect for authority-neither God’s nor man’s. The Bible does not authorize abortion; yet she had one. She admits that it was illegal (prior to January 22, 1973); yet she did it anyway. She is obviously a law unto herself and would have fit in well with the time of the judges, in which “every man did that which was right in his own eyes” (Judges 21:25).
Guilt is not determined by the way we feel about something (on an objective basis); guilt is objectively determined when we violate one of God’s holy laws. Paul once said, “Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day” (Acts 23:1). That included the time during which he persecuted Christians, of which he later wrote that he was “a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man” (1 Tim. 1:13).
The point is that Paul was guilty of objective, moral evil. But he did not feel that he was; in fact, he thought he was serving God in persecuting Christians. He lived, therefore, in “all good conscience,” like the woman who wrote the lines quoted above. Jesus had to capture Paul’s attention in an earth-shattering way and make sure that he understood his error. He did, and he repented. All we can do today is to explain the truth to people. They may continue to harden their hearts, but that is not our decision to make for them. Love will give them such an opportunity.