“Sorry, sir, but that’s a line I simply can’t cross”

I’d been talking to the man—a father or husband—at the edge of the abortion-facility pavement for nearly two hours when he said, “Can’t you just agree to support us in this hard decision?”  

For 120 minutes, I’d sought common ground, but that was a line I couldn’t cross. “I’m sorry, sir. I cannot.” 

At Mass earlier that day, on the Solemnity of St. Joseph, I’d been contemplating Joseph’s fatherly protection of Jesus, reflecting on his bravery in keeping Jesus and Mary safe by fleeing to Egypt to evade the evil King Herod. 

Pondering that in light of it being abortion day, I wondered if the men I’d be seeing later on might be as brave, or would they instead relinquish their fatherly instincts to appease a death-drawn culture? 

Kneeling in the pews, I let my imagination travel to that hard, brick building in Moorhead, and into its innermost chamber, where children are shredded weekly. I shuddered. 

As I approached the abortion facility a few hours later, I felt St. Joseph’s protection. It wasn’t long before I noticed a conversation in progress between three males: one, likely there with a client, at the south end of the parking lot, and two male sidewalk advocates opposite him.  

After setting up signs with hope-filled messages in my car windows, I joined the tension-filled conversation. Visibly offended by their proselytizing, the man on the parking-lot side didn’t want to hear about Jesus, he said; that wasn’t his God.  

I soon learned he was a father of seven, and Native American. Having grown up on the Fort Peck reservation in Northeastern Montana, I am always grieved seeing Native people seeking abortion, knowing how proud they generally are of their heritage and survivor status. Why, then, come here? 

No matter culture or creed, however, we are each given the chance to choose life or death, and we can all be blinded to the end goal. I was eager to hear him out. Could I say anything to encourage him to rescue the child about to be destroyed?  

When the other two men left, I sought a way through the conversation to bring down the man’s defenses, and over time, he did begin to relax. We were able to agree on several major points: a belief in the God who created the world and us, and in the human soul existing from day one of conception.  

This gave us a lot to work with, and at one point, I sensed a breakthrough. He’d been defending the escorts, seeing their shovels dragging on pavement as a righteous response to inhibit the gentle, firm, words coming from a man with a small speaker and microphone. “The truth,” I said, “is that the shovels came first; the microphone followed in response.” This perspective shift seemed to make a difference, and soon thereafter, he even acknowledged our good intentions. 

But in the end, he insisted there wasn’t a choice; that sometimes, a sacrifice must be made—one life for another. Though he wouldn’t divulge the particulars of his situation, he offered two hypotheticals in which exceptions should be allowed: a medical issue and rape.  

I listened to his projections and responded as compassionately as possible, but by his holding back the actual reason they “had” to go through with the abortion, it was impossible for me to speak into the specific situation. I could agree that circumstances can make these decisions difficult, but not to any justification to end a child’s life.  

“We have to find some common ground on this,” he urged. Though my compassion could extend a long way in such challenging situations, I offered, the God of life would always provide a way out, so that we never have to choose death as a remedy. 

Sadly, in the end, neither of us got what we wanted that day. I didn’t get the joy of knowing a child was saved from abortion, and he didn’t get the satisfaction of having his conscience appeased. We each walked away thanking the other for the conversation, but also, with empty hands, and, I think, hurting hearts. 

He went back to his pickup, and I wept, falling into the arms of the friends who’d been praying for me those two long hours, assuring me that though the conversation did not seem fruitful in the moment, God was there, and it mattered that we’d tried. 

Our solace in these seemingly impenetrable situations comes from this: Though for us there are limits, for God, there are none, and surely he can—and most certainly will—pick up where we have to leave off.