Democrat-Gazette online

As an evangelical Christian, I grew up thinking abortion was murder. When I heard pro-choice language like "reproductive health care" I thought it was just that: pro-choice language. The language of a political movement. The language people used when they wanted to reframe the narrative surrounding abortion away from the horror of killing babies and toward the idea that it was normal; a choice women deserved. Back then, I saw it as a lie.

When, as a teenager, I was trained as a volunteer in my church's pregnancy crisis center, the idea was to talk people into giving up their babies for adoption rather than seeking an abortion. By providing the support they needed to be able to do that, we'd be saving lives. The assumption was that women who came to us would be in the midst of an unwanted pregnancy, considering abortion as a form of birth control because they didn't use protection.

I don't remember a discussion of rape or incest, and certainly not of any need for abortion as health care in case a mother's life was at risk. Perhaps that was because Roe v. Wade was in place as the law of the land, or perhaps those cases were out of our wheelhouse. What it amounted to as part of my education was that I only thought about abortion happening to women who were likely unwed and inefficient at planning not to have a baby. We were there to help them not make the even worse mistake of becoming murderers.

Today I lean pro-choice. This sea change is the result of years of slow evolution out of a........

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