Gosnell is one of the most important and most difficult books I've ever read. That this book has been written by an Irish couple is interesting. Are Americans so in love with abortion that they cannot write honestly about it? I wonder. I thank Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer for doing the horrendous and horrific research to write Gosnell and the law enforcement officials like Jim Woods, who did not forget what they saw at a drug raid, and went back to investigate. I wish that along with Gosnell, the government officials who abdicated their responsibility and purposefully neglected their duties could also be incarcerated.
This book has so many different layers. There's Gosnell's story, how he looked like a pillar of society, providing a "necessary service" for the poor women in his community, and then there's the story of the people in their nice offices in Harrisburg, PA, who shrugged their shoulders at the complaints coming about Gosnell's practice. "People die," one government official said. I wonder if this could've happened in a rich suburb in PA. We have stories of the women who were in dire straits, who mistakenly thought there was no other way, women who were forced by their mothers or boyfriends, and we have the stories of the short lives of the babies who were in effect beheaded (their spinal cords were snipped): the baby who curled up because he was cold, the baby who tried to swim in the toilet, the baby who cried out.
The grand jury report was damning. For decades, patients and employees sent written complaints to the Department of Health but the clinic at 3801 Lancaster was not inspected. No matter what Gosnell did, butchering both women and babies as late as 34 weeks, there were no consequences. The governor himself "put a blanket of invincibility around the doctor and his house of horrors."
The judge did not want the grand jury's report to become fodder for anti-abortion activists. The case wasn't about abortion, which is barbaric even when done right. It was to interpret the born-alive law. Gosnell didn't do a plea bargain; he was sure of his acquittal given that the judge and jury were pro-abortion. The District Attorney's office was frustrated about spending taxpayer money putting a man on trial for murdering babies that their mothers didn't want in the first place. Did they even have a case?
Ann and Phelim ask the hard questions. "So many in the pro-life world fear to ask this: If abortion is murder, then why weren't the mothers prosecuted too? Weren't they at the very least accessories to the crime? Like getaway car driver for bank robbery. The mothers were paying for the killing. They had to make the evidence of Gosnell's guilt so overwhelming that the jury would ignore the possible culpability of the mothers in the crime."
What's chilling is that Gosnell was convicted of murder because he killed the babies after they were born. We only know about 50 or so because investigators found their frozen or refrigerated remains, but one can imagine how many thousands of babies Gosnell killed over a period of 30 years. However, had he killed them inside the mother's womb, it is legal. This should make us all stop and think.
Why?
Why is the baby in the womb not a person?
Why is he or she not afforded protection?
Why do we want to keep abortion legal at all costs?
Ann and Phelim aren't extraordinarily religious, nor were they ever interested in the pro-life cause, but in examining Gosnell, they were changed. Ann said that words failed her. How does one write about such evil? The only thing she could compare it to is Auschwitz--the place where man forgot his humanity.
I wept reading this book. So will you. Pray to end abortion. Parce Domine.
9 comments:
I do find it hard to understand, but I also leave it to the Great Judge.
Speaking of serial killers, many years go I read a book about Ted Bundy. It haunts me to this day. I won't read about such anymore.
Wow. That would be a difficult read. It's a shame we don't talk to each other anymore on a global scale. We hide behind our ideologies and can't have back and forth dialogue on important issues like this, and we sorely need them. I hope this book is widely read.
Replying a year later...not sure how I missed your comments but now they've made a movie and it hides the gore but still shows what abortion is, through the testimony of a very clean and very pretty doctor.
Mirka, I remember seeing a documentary on Bundy and it was chilling. In the film, the actor who plays Gosnell did it so well, it brought some passages of the book to life. It must've been a very difficult role to play.
Johnell, this book is so important because it shines a light not just on late term abortion but what it is even at the early stages--the snuffing out of an innocent life--murder.
I have watched the movie which was very well done, great film. The book which i have read was a horrific journey into the depravity of sin, a peer into what sin can do to a individual and the people around them. Gosnell.. He is evil no doubt but surprisingly complex. Studying him has brought up some questions as to what went wrong in his life that made him this twisted, he truly is a mystery. Was Gosnell just born a monster, a mistake of nature? If this is the case, then that would imply that God is the author of evil since it states in the bible that God knows us before we are formed in the womb and created us with such complexity. Or was Gosnell born a purely innocent baby just like the rest of us?
Was it that during his younger years of his life, he started out with good intentions but he slowly fell more and more into sin which hardened his heart and conscience? They say that God has a purpose for everyone but what was Gosnell's purpose then? If he was born purely evil with no inherent goodness within him then he is exactly like the devil in which God cannot save Gosnell from his wickedness. He is then a literal demon in the flesh with no redeeming qualities whatsoever.God's grace will not reach him, because he was born damned with a devilish personality and a rotten soul.
Unknown, such good questions. I lost my faith over the problem of evil when I was 12. Here's how I'm beginning to come to terms with it. We are fallen and we have a tendency to sin. I don't think Gosnell was born bad or evil. But he chose to do evil. Perhaps he had a terrible childhood. Perhaps he thinks he's doing good. Many people justify doing evil because they think it's a good (oh look, the mother can barely feed herself or the baby is damaged, so is better off dead) but they do not know God's plan for this baby. Deep in his heart he must know that killing a baby is wrong. He was cruel to his patients, thinking less of them because they felt they had no other choice.
That God stands outside of time and knows what we will choose doesn't mean that He made us do evil. We choose it. Gosnell can still repent and be saved. There is no sin that God cannot forgive if we are truly sorry for our sins. This is why Jesus suffered so much and died to save us--he took on the weight of all the sins--each and every one of us. The Passion of Christ by Mel Gibson captures it so well.
CS Lewis addresses this in his book: The Problem of Pain and Pope St. JPII wrote a wonderful encyclical on the Christian meaning of Suffering--Salvific Doloris: http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_letters/1984/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_11021984_salvifici-doloris.html
And still, it is very, very difficult to face evil. I can't say I understand it. Pax Christi.
Yeah.. When you look at the man Gosnell, you see a man at war with himself. To explain, while he was doing these horrid acts he helped his neighbors. It was like he was trying to balance himself out, or keep that inherent belief that he was a still good person. From what people who grew up or knew him said that he was a very caring, loving, funny, and good individual who possessed great qualities. His upbringing was a good one, from a very young age he wanted to help people. I think once he started to become involved with abortion, it twisted him little by little.
To this day he believes himself to be innocent, providing scripture verses as proof that what he did was right. Mind you he grew up in a Baptist household, so I would assume he knew about sin, the 10 commandments, etc etc. If someone attacks him or asks him about his killings he either lies, or gets extremely angry when his goodness is questioned. Delusional, packaged within a wall of self righteousness. I don't believe that the caring nature of the young gosnell was a lie, because if it was then that would imply that he was born absolutely evil which God would not do.
Gosnell is truly a one complex jigsaw puzzle, we can judge a man by his actions but never sit in the place of God when it comes to his heart or eternal fate. Only God knows all of the complexities of Gosnell, and why he did what he did. But yeah... Evil is a very complex issue that we simply don't have the complete understanding of or the whole picture to. The only thing we can do is pray for Gosnell, for every soul is precious in the eyes of God.
I mean... If Gosnell is truly a demon then Jesus would have died for naught, because that would mean there is nothing there. Gosnell is just complete darkness, but if Jesus died for him too, then there has to be a tiny piece of the young gosnell in there that God can work on.
"I think once he started to become involved with abortion, it twisted him little by little."
Yes! I believe once Gosnell got involved in the abortion industry, he lost his sense of sin and then justified it by taking verses out of context from the Bible. I doubt any of us would agree to sin if we saw its naked truth. So many times, sin is cloaked in "kindness" or "mercy" and we accept it.
I don't remember his background much but he sounds like a psychopath, cutting off the babies' feet as a trophy, using some of their remains to catch crabs. It's sickening. I think people like him can put on a mask and present themselves as pillars of the community. God have mercy. I've not been able to pray for him yet--I pray for the women--but I do pray for conversion daily, my own and those of others, so that we may be more conformed to Christ, so in a way it includes him. Oh Holy Innocents, pray for us.
When we were going through RCIA I remember thinking I don't want a heaven that includes people like Hitler and Stalin and Pol Pot. I still don't like the idea. But I came to the same conclusion as you--God is the judge. Only He knows the state of a soul. And I believe He is both just and merciful. Parce, parce Domine.
A psychopath huh.. If that's the case, then Gosnell will not turn to Christ no matter how much we pray for him. God's grace won't penetrate the dead shell of a absolute cold blooded monster, psychopaths, sociopaths, and narcissists are like the unholy trinity. He was born dead, similar to a cold blooded reptile that from the beginning cannot love, care, show compassion etc etc. A demon to put it bluntly. "Before I formed thee, I knew thee."
God created Gosnell, shaped his twisted personality, his disordered demonic like qualities, and a evil mind.... Perhaps very few people are born evil, it's looking to be very obvious. Had Gosnell been born nerotypical, none of this would have happened. In fact, if everyone was born nerotypical, then the world would be in a much better state than this disgusting state. Some are just born mistakes. It would have been better had people like Gosnell never been born, had he been aborted it would have saved him and countless people the horrific pain he implemented and the hell that awaits him.
Your right, Pol pot, and the rest of those demons are rightly burning in hell. It would be unjust of a "good" God to let someone like Gosnell in after all that he has done. The bible speaks of people who are referred as the devil's children, perhaps Gosnell was one from the very beginning. I hope he fries in the deepest pits of hell, I'm very much looking foward to his death.
I no longer wish hell upon anybody. There is great peace in trusting the infinite wisdom of God. The final judgment is left up to God. We only have opinions, but God knows the soul. God created Gosnell. But Gosnell is the way he is today because of the choices he made. He chose to listen to the devil, believe in him and his lies. He chose to become a murderer. God didn't turn him into a monster (even though He knew what Gosnell would choose).
And so the problem of evil remains. It's hard to see how any good can come out of the holocaust, why God allows it, but I know this--Jesus is with the suffering, and He makes all things new in His Precious Blood (I am no longer the same person I was until I turned away from sin). We are free to choose. We are either with Him or against Him. God doesn't send anybody to hell; we choose it. I mean, if you hate Jesus, why would you want to spend all eternity with Him in heaven? And that is meant by the children of the devil--that they choose evil, not that they were born evil. There is time for Gosnell to repent while he's alive.
Pax Christi.
ps: These thought experiments have been done before. Would it be a sin to kill off Hitler before he could kill so many Jews? Yes! Because baby Hitler is innocent. And you cannot fight evil with evil. Only good can overcome evil.
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