Reclaiming Our Children: A Blog About Healing After Abortion

To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven:
 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant,
and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
 a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
 a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace,
and a time to refrain from embracing;
 a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
 a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

Today we live in a “quick fix” society. Somehow we have gotten to the point that even when sad things happen, we are not allowed to mourn. We have an endless supply of drugs made to cover up our emotions, and many people believe there is something wrong with them if they feel anything but happy. It is as if there are acceptable and unacceptable emotions.

I have heard many people, some in my own family, speak about how they do not want to be a “burden” to their children when they get old. We complain about the self centeredness of the younger generations and yet our society seems to promote this idea of being a burden. We have taken away the opportunity to learn and grow in love through self sacrifice, instead creating a “if it feels good do it” mentality.

In the case of abortion, many women have run far from their feelings, partly because of their own denial and partly because no one wants to speak of it.  I often describe it as the elephant in the living room that everyone is pretending does not exist. We fight against our “negative” emotions as if we were waging a war, and yet, the happiness we seek, in spite of our best efforts, often evades us because we do not allow ourselves to feel pain.  We want the joy of love, but we do not push ourselves to grow in love, even when it is painful. We have lost a sense of commitment, through the good times and the bad. We have lost a sense of being fully human with all of our emotions. We are lonely and sad many times because we do not allow ourselves to feel our sadness and so get stuck having no affect at all.

As Ecclesiastes tells us, “to everything there is a season…a time to weep, a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance…”  As we enter the summer season may we allow our emotions to be felt, then we will be free to feel the joy of new life within our souls.  -TB