by Michael Ryan
Can we agree that fewer abortions would be a good thing? Can we also agree that tormenting women isn’t the way to go about it?
Apparently not.
Two companion bills before the Missouri House and Senate would require women to choose burial or cremation for their aborted fetuses. Like they don’t have enough on their minds. Like that will significantly lower the incidence of abortion.
Even staunch pro-lifers realize such a bill won’t help either the pro-life cause or its image.
“No, not necessarily,” says Kathy Edwards, CEO of abortion alternative clinic Resource Health Services, formerly Rachel House, in Kansas City. “Legislation is nice, but it doesn’t change morality. It doesn’t change your heart. Listening to someone, loving someone, being helpful to someone, is different than having them change their whole life to be like you want them to be.”
Fact is, I completely understand and agree with the principle of the bills. Aborted fetuses should be considered the human remains they are, not fodder for the trash incinerator or research lab. I would heartily approve of the bills’ strict regulations on what abortion clinics may do with aborted fetuses. I can even see requiring that women at least be given the option of choosing burial or cremation.
But not a mandate on the patients, which House Bill 431 sure seems to issue: “The physician or qualified professional must present the woman with written materials regarding choices for disposition of her child and the woman shall inform the provider of her choice prior to the procedure.”
If you follow law or legislation, you know the intentional coercive power of the word “shall.” It gives no option, leaves no leeway. The woman “shall” make that choice. Period.
That’s the spot where I hop off these bills’ bandwagon, as do other pro-life advocates I talked with.
“The body of any human being should be treated with respect. Aborted remains I believe should be treated properly,” says Ron Kelsey, board president of abortion alternative Kansas City Pregnancy Clinic. “Now, I don’t think the woman should be involved in that. That should be the abortion clinic or whoever gets the aborted remains. That’s not something I would want to burden a woman with.”
I’m with him. It’s bills like this that likely inspired a traveling businesswoman sitting next to me in a Missouri restaurant to tell someone on the phone, “They hate women here.”
There are an awful lot of women in Missouri for a place that supposedly hates them. But indeed, bills such as HB 431 and SB 101 call for simply tormenting women who’ve made the regrettable choice to abort. In fact, SB 101 says disposition of the remains may be assigned to a woman’s next of kin but not to the abortion clinic, and the remains must be returned to the woman or the funeral home of her choice — forcing her to deal with the remains.
That’s no doubt the entire point — rubbing a woman’s nose in it, in the hopes of inspiring an epiphany-by-force about the sanctity of life. What is that supposed to bring on — belief by bayonet? Why not just require that women be given the burial and cremation options, and let them take a pass on it if they want — leaving the facility to then choose?
As written, the Missouri bills do nothing for the pro-life cause, of which I am a committed participant, and do, in fact, further erode an insulting image of pro-lifers promulgated by a predominantly liberal media.
Granted, Missouri pro-life advocates may not have much to worry about when it comes to image. There’s only one abortion clinic in the state, a Planned Parenthood in St. Louis hanging by the thread of a lawsuit. And the state recorded just 39 abortions last year, according to Missouri Right to Life.
But a fire set to the pro-life image can only spread, and pro-life advocates in Kansas in the next year will be asking voters to pass a constitutional amendment affirming the legislature’s authority to pass regulations on the practice. That’s because the Kansas Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that the right to abortion is found in a state constitution that doesn’t happen to mention the word.
Pro-life advocates on the Kansas side are keenly aware, though unbowed by, their media image — one I think is exceedingly unfair given all they do for women. I’ve seen it firsthand, in my support for Christian-based care pregnancy centers, which provide comprehensive prenatal, labor-and-delivery and parenting programs. Edwards’ Resource Health Services, with four locations in Kansas City, provides intensive education programs for both women and men, ultrasounds, referrals to all kinds of social services and more.
“If she’s hungry, we get food. If she’s homeless, we get her a place to live, so she can just get all the care that she needs,” Edwards says. Technically, support follows their clients for a year, but Edwards says in truth she and her team are there for women indefinitely.
Kelsey, who has helped start four area pregnancy centers with his wife Donna, says their comprehensive services follow clients for a minimum of three years. Services are free in these clinics, supported by donations, grants and partnerships, and in many cases the patients and their partners can earn points redeemable for products they need in bringing up the baby.
“I would say that we are typically characterized as being unthinking and unfeeling,” says Danielle Underwood, director of communications for Kansans for Life. “And it’s sad that we would be portrayed that way, because I think that nothing could be further from the truth.
“The heart of the pro-life movement is expressed in the pregnancy care centers where we, one on one, provide actual support to women.”
How the pro-life community is portrayed, and how it presents itself, is a matter of increasing urgency.
“It really is critical what happens in Kansas,” Underwood says. Which is precisely why legislative bills that make the pro-life side look the least bit callous won’t help.
Michael Ryan is a columnist for The Kansas City Star.
