Miracles do happen at a busy downtown abortuary – at least once a week. The lives of babies are saved because their distressed mothers are offered help by front-line pro-lifers who run a referral and refuge centre called Aid to Women in Toronto. Counsellors Joanne and Robert estimate that over the last decade some 1,000 babies have survived because someone was on the street or at the office phone, at the right moment, to offer a distressed woman practical, financial, or emotional help to carry her baby to term.
Amazingly, despite the heartbreaking disappointments of those women who refuse help, there are some who choose life. It is these miracles of divine grace and light that give courage to pro-lifers to continue the difficult work of spreading a culture of life next door to a house of death. The following story is about one of these miracles. It happened a few years ago and could have occurred at any other abortuary.
An attractive couple in their 30s came out of the abortuary looking quite dejected. Robert, standing nearby, approached them. “Can I help you? I noticed you’ve just come out of the clinic.”
The man answered sharply, “No, it’s too late. I’ve already paid them $800.” He said that his lady friend was an American with no health insurance and besides, she had just quit her job. “We just can’t afford this child,” he said bluntly.
Undeterred, Robert told him Aid to Women could help him with his money problems. Shrugging, the man replied, “No, I’ve already put it on my credit card.”
Robert quickly replied, “Hey, man, if they take your money from a credit card, why can’t you cancel it?” The man didn’t get it, so Robert explained, “Go back in there and take that $800 off your credit card. That way you save your money and your child.” And that’s exactly what the man did. He went back into the abortuary and canceled the abortion on his credit card.
In the office, the man told Robert that he was divorced and paying monthly child support payments, living from paycheck to paycheck. His lady friend was also divorced with children and now unemployed. Robert saw their case as one of “dire need” so he decided to draw upon his special fund to help them. He called on a personal friend with a well-paying job, who had earlier offered to help when they were “in dire need” and someone in his local church’s prayer group who had made the same offer. The money from these two gifts enabled him to give the man the required advance deposit on future hospital and delivery costs, which were a major worry for the couple.
As it happened, the man worked at a nearby garage and was so grateful for Robert’s help that he arranged for Robert’s fragile second-hand car to be repaired at cost price. Then, after baby Todd was born, the couple came back to visit their friends at Aid to Women. The man left a donation. He had just been left some money recently by a relative and wanted to share it with the centre to help others in distress.
