Random Post

Okay. This post may be really out there and totally random, but it's something I've been thinking about the last couple of days.

A couple of nights ago, while Aaron was doing some exercising in our bedroom, I sat down to relax a bit after putting the children to bed. I turned on the T.V. and did a little channel surfing. I stopped on a biography channel where they were interviewing a young woman. She seemed very well put together, beautiful and had a friendly smile. I didn't recognize the woman, but felt a connection with her, because at the moment I turned it on, she was talking about losing her mother to skin cancer, and broke down. (Her mother had died when this woman was two, after going into the doctor about a strange mole on her shoulder. It turned out to be malignant and she was dead two months later. For those of you who read this blog, you know I had my own scary mole situation a couple of months ago.)

They then went into the promo for the next segment where some "evangelical" pastor said that this woman was going to hell and that may she never have children so that they don't know the pain of having this woman as a mother. They then flashed her name on the screen. I now knew who she was. This puts me at an advantage to you. Before I reveal the woman's name, let me ask you a couple of questions.

Do you believe that anyone has the right to tell anyone else, no matter who they are or how they chose to live their lives, that they are going to Hell? Certainly not! I heard a sermon once about the five surprises of Hell, and I think it could also be done for Heaven. One of the surprises was about who else was there. You know, I don't know this woman's heart or that pastor's, but I do feel that I have a pretty good relationship with my Savior and he said, "Judge not, lest you be judged." There is another verse that says we are all unclean things and all of our good works are as filthy rags. I kind of think the same thing about our "bad" works. God does not put some big scale up there and judge you based on your good and bad works. Man judges by the outward appearance, but God sees the heart.

This woman also struggles with infertility. She has tried for years to get pregnant. She wants to live for her mother through the birth of a child. She wants to give her mother a gift of being able to care for her children as her own mother wanted to do. Like I said above, people have said that they hope she is never able to bring children into this world. This woman is healthy, well-off, intelligent, clean and sober, caring and funny. Do we have the right to tell any woman that she shouldn't have children? Again, I say, NO! If we okay it, to take away such a deeply personal right...the right to bear children...what comes next? If we were to regulate who could have children, would we then regulate how many children we could have, or even the age we could have children or receive assistance in having children? That is a slippery slope that I do not want to contribute to or think anyone I know would want to contribute to. I rejoiced when I saw on her Wikipedia profile that she recently had a successful IVF treatment and is expecting twins early 2009. To me this woman is human and deserves that right and that experience.

After writing this, I don't know if I should tell you yet, who the woman is. I would be interested in a dialogue about our feelings for any woman, not based on who she is or what she has done. I'll update it on Monday with the name of the woman.