Reclaiming Our Children: A Blog About Healing After Abortion

Came across this post from 2005 about a retreat theme I attended where Fr Andrew Apostoli, CFR was the director….truly miss his warm smile, wise words and joyful heart!

“One of His disciples, the one Jesus loved”

This summer I attended a week’s retreat at Ender’s Island in Mystic Ct.; a little bit of heaven on earth. Retreats are always so refreshing, a refocus on the things that really matter in life, namely, our relationship with God. A call to keep focused on “the God of works” not the “works of God”. A reminder I personally need all the time.

Father Andrew Apostoli, CFR led the retreat on the Gospel of St John, “the one whom Jesus loved;” words of St John himself.

At first reading of the Gospel, we may tend to think John presumptuous to state such a thing. We may think, “Didn’t Jesus love the other disciples too?” “Who does he think he is? Such conceit!” But in fact, the opposite is true. St John had great humility! He knew he was loved, not because of who he was, but because of who Jesus was! St. John was touched by Jesus. He had that confidence of heart that comes from knowing personally, the great love Jesus had for him. It was this same confidence of heart that gave St John the courage he needed to stand at the foot of the cross with Mary.

Was that same love there for the other disciples? Of course, it was! They just did not trust that love enough yet, and so they were fearful and in their human weakness unable to stand at Calvary. They did not understand that their strength needed to come from Christ himself and that even John was incapable of it on his own.

St John wrote his gospel to let us know of Jesus’ transforming love for each of us. His statement of “the one that Jesus loved” was not made in self-interest or pride, but in humility. A humility born of the knowledge that he could do nothing without the love of God, and all things with it. He tells us this same healing love and confidence is there for each of us.

So it is with the healing from a past abortion…in our human weakness we can never accomplish it. Although we must seek out knowledge and help from those qualified, we must also allow the love of Jesus to lead us. We must trust in His love for us and His desire for our healing.

This, of course, does not diminish the responsibility those of us who are post abortive have in our abortions, we each participated in the death of our children, however, like John, our knowledge of Jesus and confidence in His love for us will give us the courage we need to stand at the foot of the cross of our own abortions. It may be painful, but in the end we will experience the resurrection and find joy in life again. Then with St John we can say, “the post abortive woman/man whom Jesus loves”.

Theresa Bonopartis