When I was first experiencing the effects of my abortion, I began to write down and memorize scripture verses about guilt, hope, forgiveness, faith and any of the emotions that I was dealing with at the time.
One of the verses I wrote down was about faith.
It read:
“Faith is the realization of what’s hoped for and evidence of things not seen”
I really liked this verse although I didn’t fully understand it at the time.
However, it did mention hope and faith, two things I was desperate to have.
I thought I needed Faith to strengthen me to keep me going.
Hope, that God would somehow get me through this pain.
This “definition” of Faith however, seemed more like a concept to me.
Since then I’ve learned that Faith is not a concept.
Faith is a Gift, a gift from God, and that gift is a Person,And that Person is Jesus Christ!
But because I didn’t really know who Jesus was before and after my abortion(besides the basics) it was it was hard for me to understand and accept that someone, anyone, could love me so much, to forgive me for what I had done. I’ve learned that not accepting this gift of faith, this grace of God’s forgiveness, is to not accept that Jesus died for sinners, including me.
.
Now I didn’t do this consciously, it was just too difficult for me to understand.
I had to know humility --- which is an understanding of who I was in relationship to God.
I hadn’t spent much time getting to know God in my life so I really didn’t know what that relationship was. It was hard for me then to have faith and trust in Him if I didn’t have humility ---this understanding of who I was in relationship to Him.
Who was I to God?My healing from abortion helped me to learn humility.
When I first started feeling the effects of my abortion it was in 1989 after my son was born. A few years earlier before I was married I had an abortion.
I wasn’t forced by my boyfriend or threatened to be abandoned by my parents.
I chose abortion because I thought it would be the best solution to my “problem’.
I was very insecure and worried about what others would say and think about me and the abilities the father and I had, to take care of a child when we weren’t in a good position financially or emotionally to do so.
For the next few years after my abortion I was in denial. I mostly thought that it was the only thing I could have done at the time. After giving birth to my son a few years later, all the denial that I had built up around by abortion crumbled and I was left with the realization that abortion had ended the life of my first child. As much as I tried to push the feelings back down, the guilt and remorse, the horror at what I had done filled my every thought and made life unbearable.
Although I had not been attending Mass for years, or been faithful to God in any way, I knew that I needed to go to confession. I made an appointment to speak to a priest at a church by my home. I felt that my sin of abortion was such, that I couldn’t just go to Confession but needed to speak directly to a priest and confess my sin.
The priest I spoke with was very kind and compassionate and assured me of God’s love for me and His forgiveness. I left the rectory after Confession thinking that I would feel enormous relief and that this crushing burden of guilt and pain I was caring would be gone. (I think I remember hearing stories about sinners feeling this tremendous relief and freedom after confessing their sins to God and the healing from the sacrament would wash over me and I would know peace.) However, that’s not what I felt. As a matter of fact I began to feel worse.
This same priest eventually gave me information about post abortion counselors who help women who are suffering from PAS. I started to go to counseling weekly and continued to go to Mass not just on the weekends but during the week.
I started saying the rosary, memorizing scripture verses about forgiveness and how God washes away our guilt, but still I felt consumed with guilt and regret.
How could I have done something like this ?All those reasons for having an abortion seemed now to be things that I could have dealt with or that were not that important as they seemed at the time.
I thought that one of the reasons I had for not gaining any peace from confession was because I really did not accept God’s forgiveness. If I really did, then I would know their peace and forgiveness. So, I kept going to confession but not to confess my sin of abortion but my sin of not accepting God’s forgiveness. I thought I was doing something wrong. Priests in the confessionals would tell me “you need to accept God’s forgiveness” But how do I do that? I began to think: I was still offending God after He had forgiven me, because I was not feeling better or at peace.
Well my “confessing” took me to many different churches and priests because I couldn’t keep going back to the same priest and keep confessing what he already told me to do! One afternoon as I was driving home from a church quite a way from my home after confessing again how I was having a hard time accepting God’s forgiveness, I felt worse then I ever had before. The blackness of despair engulfed me, and I felt completely helpless and alone. It was like looking into a black abyss of nothing. How could this be when I go to church and cry out to God all the time for help. How could He not be here?
When I got home I climbed the stairs to my apartment and just lied on the bed and felt this nothingness that was more frightening then even the guilt and grief I felt about my abortion.
In the midst of this, as I looked up at the ceiling I heard a voice say: “Your Faith Has Saved You”. Those words have since meant a great deal to me ,but at the time quite frankly they only startled me enough to think, “Excuse me.. “what’s that supposed to mean?” As far as I knew I had no faith! In fact, that was my problem!! What could these words possibly mean to me? “Your Faith Has Saved You”. As far as I knew, the reason why I felt so guilty was because I had NO Faith. How could my faith save me if I had none?
To be hones, at the time, those words didn’t really mean anything to me.
I had never heard of them before. If anything-- they just confused me, so
I got me out of bed to cook dinner.
Well that was over 20 years ago and through God’s grace and the help of people He has sent into my life to help me deal with the emotional and spiritual hurt and suffering of abortion, I have been able to heal, and attain that peace that I was so desperately looking for.
.
Its actually only been in the last few years that I’ve thought more about those words I heard that day. And I do know now, that the graces I received through the sacraments of Confession and Eucharist did sustain and strengthen me during those times.
I’ve come to know that those words that I never had heard before are actually words spoken by Jesus in the Gospel to at least 4 people.
When I looked at each one of these encounters these people had with Jesus, I began to see how meaningful those words were then and now.
1) In Marks Gospel there’s a blind man named Bartimaues, who is sitting by the side of the rode begging when he hears that Jesus is passing by. He starts to yell
to scream out to Jesus saying, “have pity on me”. Jesus calls him to come to Him and He asks what he wants, the blind man replies, “Lord that I may see”. Jesus replies
“Go your way. Your faith has saved you.”
2) The woman who suffered with a hemorrhage, (bleeding) for over 12 years and had tried everything to get healing and relief thought that if she could just touch the hem of his garment she would be healed. Jesus felt the power of his healing flow from him and He asked “Who is it that touched me?”The woman fell down at his knees and poured out her troubles. Jesus replied “Daughter, Your faith has saved you . Go in peace you are cured of your affliction.”
3) Luke tells of 10 Lepers standing off in the distance as Jesus approached a village on his way to Jerusalem. They cried out to Him “Jesus have pity on us!” Jesus said to them “go show yourselves to the priest”, and on their way they noticed they were healed.
Only 1 of the 10 returned fell on his knees to thank Jesus. Jesus said “ Were there not 10 who were healed.”Then He said, “Stand up and go .Your Faith has saved you.”
4) And then there is the pardoning of the sinful woman. The woman who barged into a party Jesus was at and stood behind him and wept so hard the tears were covering his feet and she knelt before him and dried them with her hair. The Pharisee hosting the party thought to himself, “ If only Jesus knew who this sinful woman was, who was touching Him”, and Jesus knowing his thoughts asked him, “If 2 people are forgiven a debt and one of them has a greater debt to be paid who of the two would be the most grateful?” The Pharisee replied, “The one who has been forgiven much.” Jesus said, “So I tell you her many sins have been forgiven. Hence she has shown great love.” And He said to the woman, “Your sins are forgiven. Your faith has saved you go in peace”
So, I wondered:
1) Was I like the blind man in complete darkness?
Like a blind person who was stretching out his hand and begging to be healed? Yes
2) Was I desperate like the hemorrhaging woman and needed to rely on God as my only hope for healing? Yes
3) Did I feel like a leper filled with shame?
Like an outcast, crying out to the Lord “please Lord, have pity on me, help me?”
Did my sin eat away at me and make me feel like I needed to keep hidden and isolated in my pain? Yes
4) And
Was I like the woman in the Gospel who wept tears of repentance at the feet of Jesus?
All those times I cried alone in front of the tabernacle or at home throughout the days and nights?
Did I hear that same condemning voice that said “If only He knew what kind of woman she was“… those voices that didn’t come from others but from my own fears. If he only knew what I was really like. what I had really done and why. Would he let me touch Him? Yes
Yes, I was very much like that woman.
And He didn’t push me away but held me up as one who was praised by Him for her tears of repentance and great Love.
I used to think when hearing some of the Gospel stories that I had to have a great faith in order to be healed, But these encounters with Jesus in the Gospels taught me otherwise.Like those people in the gospels who heard the same words spoken to them, I had the Faith the size of a small MAYBE.
Maybe if I cry loud enough He’ll hear me and have pity on me…….
Maybe if I can just touch Him a little it will be enough to make me feel better…………
Maybe if I stretch out my hand in He can grab hold of me and pull me out of the darkness. Just maybe He can heal me of this. He’s my hope. That’s all I had then. Just a maybe.But that’s all I needed All He needed.
I was “dead by my transgressions and Jesus did save me through faith.”
That faith, that gift which became trust, and in order to have trust in him I needed to have humility. Humility an “understanding who we are in relationship to God”
I know now I am a beloved daughter of God. I’ve come to trust God to grow closer to Him and to accept his mercy To accept Jesus’ forgiveness because I know now who I am in relationship to Him. I am his beloved daughter. Where once my understanding was no more then a MAYBE, it has become an acceptance of the gift of God. I know now what those words mean: “Your Faith Has Saved You”
That Faith which is a GIFT. And that Gift Who is JESUS.
-anonymous-K (reprint)
