When Abortion Is a Sacrament
By Editorial Staff
Published April 2008
The lights were low, and Native American flute music played softly. A counselor held the woman’s hand, whispering words of comfort as she began to surface from a guided meditation. Then the doctor showed the woman a covered silver bowl that held the tiny remains of her six-week pregnancy. She curled her fingers around his, and her face, now damp with tears, softened as he began their ceremony of letting go.
“We ask your blessing, in the name of love,” Curtis Boyd, M D, began softly. Before becoming a doctor, Boyd was a foot-washing Baptist minister in rural East Texas. He left the fold but took with him an abiding faith in the power of ceremony to heal, honor, and comfort.
“Women because of what they are bombarded with in the media and by anti-abortion groups get the message that what they are doing is wrong and that they are bad people,” Boyd says, “A ceremony says the woman is a good and caring person who made the best decision she could under difficult circumstances. It also gives her a way to honor the fetus to be aware of her grief and to express her loss.”
In the nearly eight years I worked as a counselor and medical assistant at Boyd’s clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico, I witnessed many ceremonies. Some were for couples whose fetuses had died or had medical anomalies. Others were for women who, for whatever reason, knew that it was not the nighttime to bring a child into their world and sought a way to make peace with that decision.
Each blessing ritual was individually designed. One Buddhist couple set up an altar, complete with incense, candles, and rice cakes. Native American women sometimes brought corn meal for sprinkling during their blessings. Boyd has since retired from performing surgery, but he and his wife and partner, psychologist Glenna Halvorson-Boyd, still guide the work done at her Albuquerque and Dallas clinics. All patients have an opportunity to perform their own rituals or to create new ceremonies with the help of counselors.
This particular afternoon, in the soft light of the surgery room, Boyd concluded the ceremony with a prayer: “We ask that you honor this woman’s courage and bless her and her family as they move forward in their lives.”
PATRICIA O’CONNOR
New Age, March/April, 1998, p. 17
Massacre of Innocence (DVD)
Exposing The Occult Roots of Abortion
This presentation looks at the spiritual roots of abortion and exposes the myths surrounding child killing. Little known historical facts about abortion and how they relate to modern feminism are presented logically and accurately. Has been effective in converting many to a pro-life position.
Massacre of Innocence goes where no pro-life presentation has gone before in “tearing the lid off abortion” to reveal the spiritual realities we must battle if we will bring an end to this crime. The presentation is absorbing, fast-paced, informative and incredibly devastating to any attempt to justify abortion.
“… an extraordinary statement … a powerfully articulate presentation about what abortion really means, and why a great and moral nation like the United States must not allow the slaughter to continue.”
— Congressman Robert K. Dornan
Running time: 85 minutes
$19.95 — ORDER NOW!
Click here for more information
Forerunner - Home » The Champion » Witchcraft and Abortion
Your comments are welcome!
I am pro-choice because my great-grandmother required an abortion to save her life, in the early 1900s when abortion was still illegal. I am therefore against all fundamentalists, papists, and dotheads who think abortion should be illegal.
Posted by Adrian on 07/09/2009 06:31 PM #
Let me state right up front that I am a Witch. Having said that I realize you will most likely disregard anything else I say from this point on, however, I would like to point out that what you have displayed here is appalling. First of all, you have obviously misrepresented the article about the woman in the abortion clinic. A woman engaging in meditation, and ceremony to assist her in dealing with the emotions and feelings present because she has decided to terminate a pregnancy, which I will have you know is a painful decision regardless of your religious views, is a far cry from sacrificing a fetus, or an infant. I understand that you and people like you have strongly held opinions, and a powerful faith in your religion. I am also certain that this faith has indeed strengthened you in your life, and has allowed you to become closer to your god. I am certain of these things even though I do not practice your faith. If I as a Wiccan, and a Witch can afford you the courtesy and respect of giving you the benefit of the doubt and not accusing you of being cannibals because you eat the body and blood of your savior, and making the attempt to understand and support your religious choices, shouldn’t you be kind enough to afford me the same consideration? I do believe there is enough hate, and evil in the world with out honest faith-filled people like you and I adding to it.
Posted by Liz on 09/29/2009 03:22 AM #
“My great-grandmother required an abortion to save her life”
Wouldn’t a mother give her own life for her child?
Posted by Juan Oskar on 10/30/2009 10:27 PM #
The Four Keys to the Millennium (Book)
Foundations in Biblical Eschatology
By Jay Rogers, Larry Waugh, Rodney Stortz, Joseph Meiring. High quality paperback, 167 pages.
All Christians believe that their great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will one day return. Although we cannot know the exact time of His return, what exactly did Jesus mean when he spoke of the “sign of His coming” (Mat. 24)? How are we to interpret the prophecies in Isaiah regarding the time when “the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea” (Isa. 11:19)? Should we expect a time of great tribulation or reformation and revival before the Lord returns? Is the devil bound now, and are the saints reigning with Christ? Did you know that there are four hermeneutical approaches to the book of Daniel and Revelation? These, and more questions, are dealt with by four authors as they present the four views on the millennium. Each view is then critiqued by the other three authors.
$9.95 — ORDER NOW!
Click here for more information
God's Law and Society (DVD)
Download the Free on-line Study Guide!
God’s Law and Society powerfully presents a comprehensive worldview based upon the ethical system found in the Law of God.
Speakers include: R.J. Rushdoony, George Grant, Howard Phillips, R.C. Sproul Jr., Ken Gentry, Gary DeMar, Jay Grimstead, Steven Schlissel, Andrew Sandlin, Eric Holmberg, and more!
Sixteen Christian leaders and scholars answer some of the most common questions and misconceptions related to this volatile issue:
1. Are we under Law or under Grace?
2. Does the Old Testament Law apply today?
3. Can we legislate morality?
4. What are the biblical foundations of government?
5. Was America founded as a Christian nation?
6. What about the separation of Church and State?
7. Is neutrality a myth?
8. What about non-Christians and the Law of God?
9. Would there be “freedom” in a Christian republic?
10. What would a “Christian America” look like?
Perfect for group instruction as well as personal Bible study.
Ten parts, over four hours of instruction!
Running Time: 240 minutes
Watch over 60 on-line video interviews from God’s Law and Society.
$19.95 — ORDER NOW!
Click here for more information
Dr. Francis Schaeffer - A Christian Manifesto (DVD)
That Swiss Hermit Strikes Again!
Dr. Schaeffer, who was one of the most influential Christian thinkers in the twentieth century, shows that secular humanism has displaced the Judeo-Christian consensus that once defined our nation’s moral boundaries. Law, education, and medicine have all been reshaped for the worse as a consequence. America’s dominant worldview changed, Schaeffer charges, when Christians weren’t looking.
Schaeffer lists two reasons for evangelical indifference: a false concept of spirituality and fear. He calls on believers to stand against the tyranny and moral chaos that come when humanism reigns-and warns that believers may, at some point, be forced to make the hard choice between obeying God or Caesar. A Christian Manifesto is a thought-provoking and bracing Christian analysis of American culture and the obligation Christians have to engage the culture with the claims of Christ.
$19.95 — ORDER NOW!
Click here for more information
Dr. Francis Schaeffer - How Should We Then Live? (DVD)
Special Two-Disc Set!
After 40 years of intense study and world-wide ministry, Dr. Francis Schaeffer completed his crowning work of scholarship – to present profound truths in simple film language. Dr. Schaeffer’s brilliant analysis of the past and predictions for current trends have proven so uncannily accurate that this amazing series still feels contemporary almost three decades after its initial release. Ultimately, Schaeffer concludes that man’s only hope is a return to God’s Biblical absolute, the truth revealed in Christ through the Scriptures.
Available for the first time on DVD, this documentary spectacular also includes intimate in-depth conversations with Francis and Edith Schaeffer. With the on-disc study guide, this presentation forms a unique course of comprehensive study. While this series forms an innovative analysis of the past, this outstanding work is more than history. Each episode focuses on a significant era, yet speaks clearly to 21st-century man with answers for modern problems.
$49.95 — ORDER NOW!
Click here for more information
Abortion Clinic 911 Calls
Exposes the Dangers of Abortion to Women!
These shocking eyewitness accounts expose the dangers of abortion not only to unborn children, but to the health and lives women as well. An antidote to the smokescreens of the liberal media, these six short clips show what really happens in and around abortion clinics.
Although the content is emotionally gut-wrenching, these videos have been used in church seminars and small groups to educate Christians on the abortion issue and to lead people toward a pro-life position.
Watch these pro-life videos on-line.
“These videos helped change my mind from pro-choice to pro-life. Your videos are what did it for me. I will be walking in next year’s March For Life in San Francisco.” — A. Jackson, California
“I was going to have an abortion until I saw your video. Praise Jesus!”
— M. Drew, YouTube Commenter
$9.95 — ORDER NOW!
This was not unexpected, but still unwelcome.
It is true that the Wiccan Rede, ‘If it harm none, do as you will’, leaves a lot to interpetation, but I doubt it is possible to stretch its blanket of allowablity to ritual sacrifice. In the Charge of the Goddess, it is stated plainly that: ‘As I am the Mother of all things, I require no sacrifice’.
The God and Goddess gave life. They are the only ones who may take it away. And the very idea of snuffing out another life is vile and abhorrent to anyone who is a true Wiccan.
Nature itself is divinity incarnate. To harm it is the greatest of sacralige.
Blessed Be.
Posted by alirya on 10/27/2008 11:17 PM #