Abby Johnson was the director of the Planned Parenthood abortion mill in Bryan/College Station, Texas. She had worked there for eight years, but recently had a change of heart. So what caused the turnaround? She watched an ultrasound of a baby being killed in an abortion.
In an interview she said she could no longer go on with her work: "I just thought I can't do this anymore, and it was just like a flash that hit me and I thought that's it."
As one media account states, "She said she began to feel uncomfortable with Planned Parenthood's business philosophy after the organization, suffering from the economic downturn, told her to try to bring more abortions in the door. 'The money wasn't in family planning, the money wasn't in prevention, the money was in abortion and so I had a problem with that,' said Johnson.
"Johnson resigned on October 6th, near the beginning of Bryan's sixth annual 40 Days for Life campaign, and she has since joined up with the nearby Coalition for Life to begin praying near her old workplace. Coalition for Life is the local group that began 40 Days for Life, the national prayer and fasting campaign that was ongoing at the time of Johnson's resignation."
She was not the only one to leave the abortion business: "Johnson is one of eight abortion industry workers who left their jobs during the fifth coordinated 40 Days for Life campaign that concluded yesterday in 212 cities. She was the highest-ranking of the eight. Others who quit their clinic jobs included nurses, office staffers and security personnel."
David Bereit, the national director of 40 Days for Life, was justifiably exuberant: "From that first campaign in 2004, we've prayed for Abby – and for all abortion workers – that they would come to see what abortion really is, and that they would leave the deadly business. In this case, those prayers have been answered. We are so proud of Abby's courage to leave the abortion industry and publicly announce her reasons for leaving."
The second good news item involves a new documentary which has been produced giving a powerful pro-life message as it highlights the sordid and greed-driven world of the abortion industry. It also involves the story of another key abortionist who has quit the business and is now an active pro-life campaigner.
Carol Everett had been a proud owner of five abortion mills in Texas, and she claims to have personally been involved in the death of 35,000 unborn babies. But she has now fully renounced her past life, and has written up her incredible story in an invaluable book: The Scarlet Lady (Wolgemuth & Hyatt, 1991).
I have reviewed this must-read book here.
Let me offer two paragraphs from that review: "Abortion was definitely big business for Everett. She had ads in the Yellow Pages of five southern states, each with a toll-free number. Ads in newspapers offered coupons with 10 per cent discounts. Setting up clinics near high schools was an effective tactic. She even planned to set up a clinic by a mall so customers could go shopping while waiting for their abortion. Says Everett: 'Greed – the love of money and the things I could have with it – blinded me. [I was] an abortionist who used whatever means available to get a woman to have an abortion for the sake of money'.
"This insatiable lust for money resulted in abortions being performed on women who were not even pregnant! Indeed, the temptation was to get every woman who came into the clinic to have an abortion. Says Everett: 'Do you think an abortionist who works on a straight commission is going to tell a woman who has signed her consent form and has already paid in full that she is not pregnant?'"
The book was later reissued with a new, and most appropriate, title, Blood Money. That is the title of the new documentary which has been produced. It is a powerful expose of the abortion industry, and how the making of money – not concern for women – is the overriding motivation and consideration.
The film's director, David K. Kyle, said at first he just wanted to do a general documentary on the evils of abortion, but as he "travelled around the country last September doing all these interviews with various pro-life leaders and women who had had abortions, the money part just kept coming up."
"People are making millions upon millions of dollars off the murdering of innocent babies," he said. People need to hear the truth about abortion he insists: "Abortion has consequences to it. It's sold as a quick fix when you're in trouble. You can go and have an abortion and the problem goes away. Well, we know from countless women that the problem does not go away. Women have long term consequences that they are going to have to deal with for years and years."
A number of women were interviewed for the documentary, including Everett. Her claims are still shocking to hear, even though she has been sharing her story now for several decades. "We would give them [young girls] a low-dose birth control pill they would get pregnant on or a defective condom. Our goal was 3-5 abortions for every girl between the ages of thirteen and eighteen."
Evidently the film has yet to have a distributor, so it has not yet been released. But a gripping trailer of the film can be seen here.
It is hoped that this film will soon be available and widely shown. It is a very much needed look at a bloody and disreputable industry. The various testimonies, stories, and interviews make for a powerful message, a message that needs to get out into the wider community.
These two recent activities are part of a slow but steady turning of the tide in the abortion wars. They are the result of long, hard and patient work – as well as much prayer and intercession. Let us all redouble our efforts, and help make this turnaround become an unstoppable pro-life avalanche.