Abortion foes pray at Planned Parenthood
People gathered for a prayer vigil outside a Planned Parenthood facility in Flossmoor on Wednesday, the day the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in a case involving a Mississippi abortion law that could overturn precedents set by the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
About 35 people stood and listened to remarks that seemed to offer a glimpse into what the future might look like once the high court renders its decision in the case by early next summer.
The historic moment spoke volumes about faith, justice, freedom, life and democracy. Many have worked, prayed and fought for many years hoping to end abortion in the United States.
“Today was a momentous day,” said Richard Mantoan, of Chicago Heights. “It’s very hopeful the way the judges were talking today. They may be realizing this isn’t a federal right under our Constitution.”
The court’s majority of six conservative justices seemed to indicate a willingness to uphold the Mississippi law that bans abortions after 15 weeks. If Roe is overturned, many states would ban or severely restrict women’s access to abortion, but Illinois, New York, California and other states would continue to allow access.
“If Roe is overturned it’s not going to change the reality here,” Mantoan said.
Planned Parenthood opened the Flossmoor facility four years ago in anticipation that Roe v. Wade might someday be overturned. Planned Parenthood opened the first full-service reproductive health facility in the south suburbs with the expectation it would serve women from Indiana and other states.
Abortion bans in other states would disproportionately affect Blacks, Latinos, people with disabilities, people in rural areas, young people, immigrants and people with low incomes, Planned Parenthood of Illinois said Wednesday in a statement.
“Planned Parenthood of Illinois has seen this storm gathering momentum in recent years, with harsher abortion restrictions enacted nationwide, defunding of essential community health centers and programs and stacked federal courts to ensure
these policies stay in place,” the organization said.
Wednesday’s vigil revealed how activists intend to respond to the expected uptick in demand for services at the facility in the 19800 block of Governors Highway in Flossmoor and 17 other Chicago-area facilities that offer abortion services from Aurora to Waukegan.
Brian Westbrook, founder and executive director of Coalition for Life St. Louis, traveled to Flossmoor from his home in Missouri to recruit people seeking to change the minds of women seeking abortions.
The group enlists volunteers and in some cases pays workers to try to provide pregnant women with information about adoption and other services before they go through with an abortion.
The group’s motto is, “Ending Abortion Through Prayer.” The organization has 29 employees and a $1.5 million annual budget, Westbrook said.
“We looked at our 10-year history and God was calling us to do significantly more,” he said. “Our new focus is not just St. Louis, but we are expanding well beyond, to Illinois and looking at 788 abortion facilities all around the United States.”
Some court cases have established distances and set other rules governing how demonstrators on public property may interact with women seeking health care services on private property.
The St. Louis group intends to maintain a presence at the Flossmoor clinic every hour it is open throughout December and possibly into next year, Westbrook said. The group hopes to raise funds to maintain a similar presence at other Chicago-area abortion facilities.
“We know we can cover every single one of them if we’re faithful to what God has called us to do,” Westbrook said. “It costs a lot of money. Flossmoor is our first step.”
Mantoan is a dentist who practices in an office building next door to the Planned Parenthood facility. He has helped organize prayer vigils since the Flossmoor facility opened and said he supports the efforts of Coalition for Life St. Louis to enlist more people.
“We need to get the word out this opportunity is here,” Mantoan said. “That doesn’t mean we have to spend our lives here. But if we can spend an hour a week in support of the ones who will be here on a regular basis, that’s the least we could do.”
Reactions in Flossmoor and elsewhere to this week’s Supreme Court action could signal what changes may be imminent in the abortion debate. Events might also indicate profound changes in coming years in other areas.
Many believe the abortion issue is chiefly responsible for politicizing the American judiciary. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell’s refusal to consider a nomination to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court and many other federal judicial vacancies seemed to mobilize GOP voters, particularly evangelical Christians.
Some have speculated that overturning Roe v. Wade may signal the beginning of a wave of rulings that could affect same-sex marriage, public funding for religious schools and other issues.
“Elections have consequences,” some say.
Others point out how presidents who lost the popular vote appointed a majority of justices to the conservative Supreme Court. Polls indicate a majority of Americans support allowing women to have legal access to abortion. Abortion seems to encapsulate the notion of minority rule.
Perhaps a new wave of abortion restrictions will motivate liberal voters in coming years.
Maybe 50 years from now, the pendulum will have swung far in the opposition direction. A backlash to the current judicial action might stack courts, legislatures and executive branches with majorities devoted to ensuring access to abortion.
For now, though, the moment belongs to the prayerful who consider every abortion to be a loss of human life.
“Today is the reason we don’t give up,” Mantoan said. “Fifty years is a long time. But there’s hope now. We didn’t always have that until very recently. I’m very hopeful.”