The Pro-Life Message I Wish I’d Heard in High School

I don’t know about you, but there was a time in my life when I was absolutely terrified to tell anyone that I was pro-life.

Let me back up.

I grew up Catholic, went to K-12 Catholic school, the whole nine-yards. I knew that I was supposed to be pro-life, and I was pro-life, but I had spent maybe five minutes of my entire life thinking deeply about abortion. So when I went off to college, I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into.

I went to St. Olaf College, where in the fall of 2016, the students staged a massive protest against our local pro-life pregnancy center. The pregnancy center was hosting their annual fundraising banquet in the ballrooms of our student union, and when the students found out, they lined the hallways waving signs, trying to stop community members from entering and raising money to provide free resources to pregnant and parenting families.

Yeah, it took me about two seconds to realize that publicly identifying as pro-life was social suicide.

Estimated reading time: 6 minutes

I’m pregnant: The hot takes and musings of a pregnant pro-life advocate

I’m pregnant.

Thank you for all the well wishes; my husband and I are indeed thrilled to be awaiting the birth of Baby Geiger in August. (In case you missed the byline, this is your favorite ERI gal Emily Geiger, formerly Emily Albrecht. I got married last November!)

Anyways, I’m thrilled about my pregnancy.

But what if I wasn’t thrilled?

In the days after two little pink lines on a stick announced that there is a tiny human growing inside my body, I couldn’t help but imagine what life would be like if I wasn’t pro-life; if I didn’t know what I do about pregnancy and abortion; if my life circumstances were different and more challenging.

Estimated reading time: 13 minutes

The Duality of Abortion: Simple and Complex

People often have trouble recognizing when two seemingly contradictory statements are both true and not at all contradictory. (Christians ought to have a bit more practice with this, since the nature of the Trinity, for one, is a hallmark example of this kind of thing.) But it’s not enough for things to seem contradictory, nor for someone to just assert that they can’t possibly coexist; it’s important to drill down to what the statements actually mean and whether those meanings are or aren’t compatible. Unfortunately, as is often the case in arguments about abortion, people like to stay at the “seeming” level and share snarky memes rather than engaging in this next level of critical thinking. 

And so one side of the debate tells us that abortion is a complex issue, too complex for simply banning it to be an option (but, it bears mentioning, not too complex to label those who oppose abortion as “anti-choice”). Every abortion situation is unique, they say, and every possible regulation on abortion could affect a woman’s life in myriad ways, so it’s best to keep our noses out of other people’s business and simply “trust women!” The other side maintains that abortion is fundamentally simple, and anyone who says otherwise is trying to distract from the fact that “babies are murdered here.” The assumption is that one or the other of these statements is correct; either abortion is simple, or it is complex. The reality, however, is that both statements are true: abortion is a simple issue and a complex issue.

Simple and complex

Estimated reading time: 8 minutes

New Pro-Life Resource: ERI Quick Response Series

We’re excited to share our newest video series with you! Our Quick Response series is designed to provide answers for many of the most common pro-choice objections in under five minutes. We’re launching this series in a YouTube playlist with a dozen videos, but we have many more that we will be releasing on a weekly basis over the next few months!

Quick Response Series

If you want a quick reference for how to respond to people who claim the fetus is a parasite, who bring up back-alley abortions, or who talk about consenting to pregnancy, these videos are for you! They’re also perfect for sharing with others to help them understand your views, even on subjects like the Violinist Argument. You can link to them in social media dialogues, watch them to quickly brush up on your dialogue skills, or direct your pro-choice friends to them to get a conversation started. The possibilities are endless!

Here are links to each of the first twelve videos and their scripts; watch them all, or just the one that interests you right now!

Quick Response #1: The Embryo Isn’t Human: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-1-the-embryo-isnt-human/

Quick Response #2: The Embryo Isn’t a Person: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-2-the-embryo-isnt-a-person/

Quick Response #3: The Fetus Is a Parasite: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-3-the-fetus-is-a-parasite/

Quick Response #4: My Body, My Choice—A Woman’s Body Is Her Sovereign Zone: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-4-my-body-my-choice-a-womans-body-is-her-sovereign-zone/

Quick Response #5: Women Have the Right to Refuse the Use of Their Bodies – The Violinist Argument: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-5-women-have-the-right-to-refuse-the-use-of-their-bodies-the-violinist-argument/

Quick Response #6: Consent to Sex Is Not Consent to Pregnancy: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-6-consent-to-sex-is-not-consent-to-pregnancy/

Quick Response #7: Banning Abortion Forces Women to Stay Pregnant: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-7-banning-abortion-forces-women-to-stay-pregnant/

Quick Response #8: Abortion Is Necessary for Women’s Equality: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-8-abortion-is-necessary-for-womens-equality/

Quick Response #9: Abortion Is a Private Health Care Decision: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-9-abortion-is-a-private-health-care-decision/

Quick Response #10: Back-Alley Abortions: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-10-back-alley-abortions/

Quick Response #11: Banning Abortion Won’t Stop Abortions: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-11-banning-abortion-wont-stop-abortions/

Quick Response #12: We Need Broad Abortion Access for Rape Cases: https://blog.equalrightsinstitute.com/quick-response-12-we-need-broad-abortion-access-for-rape-cases/

We hope you find this to be a resource you can reference repeatedly as you continue to have conversations with different pro-choice people. You can be confident that there are answers to the toughest pro-choice arguments and be equipped as a compelling pro-life advocate. Our Quick Response series is here to help you be even more persuasive in your dialogues about abortion!