Second National Conference Highlights Men’s Regret After Abortion Involvement
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
August 12, 2008
Chicago, IL (LifeNews.com) — Two key organizations involved in the abortion debate will co-sponsor a second national conference to help highlight the pain and regret men feel who have been involved in the abortion process. While the physical and mental health issues women experience are well-documented, men are frequently forgotten.
The idea of the conference is to help men who may have been involved in an abortion decision with their partner or to perhaps pressured a partner to have an abortion to experienced healing and forgiveness.
The second component of the conference includes educating the public that there are millions of American men whose hearts are broken because of their involvement in an abortion.
The Knights of Columbus and the National Office of Post-Abortion Reconciliation are behind the conference — which follows up on one they co-hosted in San Francisco last year.
The "Reclaiming Fatherhood” conference will be held at the Marriott Hotel in Oak Brook, Illinois on September 8 and 9.
It will bring to light what Vicki Thorn, a lead conference organizer, describes as the “invisible” issue in our society and even within the Christian church: the profound effect that abortion has on fathers whose children are aborted.
Supreme Knight Carl Anderson also weighed in on the upcoming event.
“As an organization of lay men that has a strong history and commitment to life, we think it is very important to highlight the issues faced by those fathers whose children are aborted,” he told LifeNews.com.
“There are three victims of every abortion, the child and both of his or her parents, and it is our hope that this conference will be the beginning of a ministry within the Church to these fathers, who grieve the death of their unborn child in isolation and silence," he explained.
Experts including several therapists — as well as several fathers who have lost children to abortion — will address the conference.
They will cover topics including men’s healing process after abortion; abortion’s effects on men’s spirituality; fatherhood and abortion; and why men who have been involved in abortion come for help.
Anderson and Thorn believe the “Reclaiming Fatherhood” conference could help men deal with the psychological trauma of post-abortion reality the way Project Rachel – the Catholic post-abortion healing ministry Thorn founded – has helped women who have undergone abortions deal with their emotional and spiritual scars.
More than 175 people from nine countries attended the San Francisco Reclaiming Fatherhood conference.
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