Shlog Section-f

My friend Brian’s mom runs a crisis pregnancy center - sort of.  It counsel women who are pregnant and walks them through pre-birth health care, goes to doctor visits with them, helps them find a adopting family, can help them find a place to stay if they’re not able to stay with parents or friends.  They are a crisis pregnancy facility and an adoption agency.

But funds are short.  Why?

Why don’t churches and individuals fund abortion prevention programs like hers as fervently as they lobby for politicians and political parties that want to make abortion illegal?  If we really care about abortion as Christians why not fund and staff those who are really on the front lines of the fight? 

Why do you suppose it is we don’t put ourselves behind this issue any time other than election time?  Or are we but just not in the form of financing crisis pregnancy centers and the like?

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My church supports Bethany Christian Services, a crisis pregnancy center and the church just started an adoption fund to help families who want to adopt but can’t afford to.  That fund has been a little controversial in the church. 

I have a lot of little “nieces” and “nephews,” children of the former gang kids I know.  A lot of them were slated to be aborted but their moms changed their minds.  For the last ten years, I’ve been the trustee of a fund established in my late husband’s name that was set up to educate the gang kids.  The guys are now age 24 to 34 and don’t need the funds for education.  So about two years ago, it made sense to change the mission of the fund from educating the guys to providing for the needs of the kids they fathered and in many cases, abandoned.  The fund now helps these moms pay for the daycare and clothing for their kids.

I don’t do a whole lot personally on the front end of the abortion issue.  But I’m really trying to help out the young moms I know who are trying to raise those babies they chose to let live.

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Wow, Nancy.  That’s pretty front lines.

More like that.  Anybody else doing something about this issue besides voting.  I confess I’m stuck on what exactly I should do.  Looking for ides.

So far I’ve played a few shows to raise money for crisis pregnancy centers.  I gave some money to buy sonogram machines a while back.  But as far as any ongoing involvement, I’ve got nothing to tell.  But I’m looking.

I’d count working with youth and college students, who are usually single and prone to wrestling sexuality issues, as preventive involvement.  So there’s that.  But what more could I be doing on any end of this problem?  I don’t know. Do you?

I head the annual campaign at our church for our local crisis pregnancy center.  It’s called the “baby bottle” campaign.  I pick up about 300 or so baby bottles from the center that are printed with the center name on them.  Inside there’s a flier that explains the mission of the center and has a place where people can donate in memory of someone.  This is often done in memory of a child lost.  We ask each church member to take a bottle and fill it with spare change and return it at the end of the campaign.  It usually lasts 4 weeks.  They can also write a check if they prefer.  Many will take them to their place of business and put them on their desk.  Many will just fill the bottle with the change in their pocket at the end of each day.  My kid’s donate a whole months’ allowance!  The bottles are returned, emptied, and used again each year. 

Our church raised about $2300 this way last year and helped to raise over $28K for them in 2006!  This was used to purchase a sonogram machine for the center.  It is staffed by volunteers, but it takes a lot of money to keep up the equipment, lab fees, etc.  We work through the year to make or donate baby blankets, sweaters, booties, etc. as well as making welcome kits (diaper bags, t-shirts, etc.) for the newborns.  This center has done so much to help women in crisis pregnancies and have done it effectively without criticism of decisions these women are facing.  They are showing them genuine love; something many are seeing for the first time.

Beth

Our church also does the baby bottle campaign.  It runs every year from Mother’s Day (pick up bottles) to Father’s Day (return bottles.)

We also organize a group to walk in the CICPC Walk For Life. 

And we have Imago Dei, that partners with the local crisis preganancy centers throughout the year.  Last week we had a Baby Shower for Jesus, in which 12 mothers that decided not to abort their babies this year were presented with baby shower gifts that were donated by members of our church.

Great stuff to know is happening.  I know that churches don’t like to put crisis pregnancy or other measures that combat abortion from different directions in their yearly budgets. But it’s encouraging to see that that hasn’t stopped church people from getting involved on their own.

Very encouraging.

I volunteered at a pregnancy center in the past where I did stuff like sort out donations for the thrift store.  If there is a center in the area and you have a few hours on a regular basis, I’m sure they can find something for you to do. 

Sometimes it’s just hard for people to volunteer, it’s why we so often throw money at things.  For example, I am at work 9 hours a day (including my lunch break).  I also have about an hour commute each way.  I don’t function well with less than 7 hours of sleep and best with 9.  So suddenly, I’m left with four hours to get ready for work, get ready for bed, eat dinner, and do whatever else needs to be done.

Our workalohism is this country’s biggest problem.  Did you know that a lot of Americans don’t even take all of their vacation days?

Anyway, that’s why I’m pretty sure they’d be delighted with volunteers.

Our church does contribute directly to the center as part of our missions budget too.  A little over 1/3 of our annual budget is spent on missions, both local and worldwide.  We have members who volunteer there on a regular basis too.  It’s a great way to get involved in our community.

As part of our “40 Days of Community” churchwide project, we gathered and donated over 3300 pounds of food for the two local missions here in Grand Forks.  We’ve now taken on this project as a regular part of community involvement as well as our annual monentary donations.  This has in turn, gotten other churches involved more too.

Beth

A woman in our church felt called to minister to pregnant women in need.  She quit her job as a home health nurse to open a center to help them.  I have been volunteering there for about 16 months I guess.  Our church has gotten behind her and has purchased (still paying for) a house next to the church for her to use.  We house pregnant girls and sometimes single moms and their young children.

My husband is passionate about raising money for the cause and started his own “baby bottle” thing, but with mason jars instead.  He brought a case of them to church and challenged the men’s ministry group to fill them up with donations by their next meeting.  He had brought up raising money for Beginnings a few months ago and they all said it was a great idea, but nothing ever came of it. At least his mason jars are a start.

He tried to collect donations at work, nothing pushy, just a change jar...but his boss (who once attended our church and left over something stupid) decided that it wasn’t PC to collect money for something connected to a church.

In the 2 years that Beginnings has been open we’ve been able to talk one woman out of an abortion, and we’ve helped dozens of others who needed us, as well as many other families in our community. 

We also teach parenting classes for parents who hope to regain custody of their children from the state.

The greatest thing we can do is pray. We can’t always offer as much financial support as we’d like, or volunteer all our time and still be able to support families. Donating time & money is a great thing to the extent that you can, but prayer is free and can be done on a constant basis. Whenever I get frustrated about not being able to spend more time volunteering at our local Bethesda Healing center (they also counsel women who’ve had abortions and try to find them help and support.. and forgiveness), I offer up my frustrations to the Lord, trusting that He has the power to do all things.

Whenever I can find an excuse to take a “study break,” I participate in a local group that prays outside local abortion clinics. We don’t normally engage in confrontations, we just stand (or kneel) across the street and pray a Rosary, Divine Mercy chaplet or any other prayers for the women and doctors inside the clinic, and any people passing by, they might experience a conversion of heart and realize the sanctity and dignity of human life.