The Rape Predicament

Njeri* is gang raped by three men on her way home from work on a Friday evening. They leave her in the bushes, but she manages to painfully make her way to the small house where she stays alone. She hides for several days, afraid to even venture out to church on Sunday. By the time she finally gets to a doctor, she discovers she is pregnant. She is horrified and devastated. She doesn’t even know who the father is and to make matters worse, she is engaged to be married! A sinking feeling overcomes her as she wonders what exactly she will tell her fiancé!

Is this fiction? Did I make up this story? Unfortunately not. This is the sad reality of what happens to many girls around the country. What choice is one left with when faced with this situation? What does one do? Surely the only option in this situation is for Njeri to “flush” the baby, get rid of it, because this is not a child conceived in love. Her upcoming wedding is even in jeopardy if her fiancé finds out about it. Her testimony of purity is ruined and her faith is put on trial “Where was my God when these men attacked me?” she cries. “Does God really care about me?” Feeling that way, many girls abandon their faith at the doorsteps of abortion clinics believing that is the end of it all. Surely God will understand …

There is no easy or straightforward solution for this predicament. Telling the family, and particularly the unsuspecting fiance, would be a very difficult thing to do. Often the family unfortunately assumes the girl is to blame and is somewhat at fault for the rape. Why was she on that lonely path after dark? Didn’t she know that was dangerous? This blame game takes the victim down a path of self-condemnation and shame and rather than face the family, she would rather opt to flush and get it over with. There – it’s done. No more questions. It’s over.

But is it? I recall a young woman who once came to us, full of remorse because her tubal pregnancy was terminated in order to save her own life. She felt it would have been better for her to die than willingly take the life of her innocent child. Why would she feel that way? After all, everyone knows a tubal pregnancy cannot be sustained to deliver a live baby. But the human heart feels the pain of death, even in such a medically-necessary pregnancy termination. Doctors, who take an oath in medical school to save lives, not destroy them, know they are going against that very oath every time they perform an abortion. A Christian doctor once told me he had done only one abortion in his life, and that was on a terminally ill cancer patient. She would not live long enough to give birth, so he terminated her six-week pregnancy. But he still felt the pain of what he had done – terminating an innocent life.

Here’s the bottom line – life is sacred. Every child conceived is valuable in the eyes of God, no matter the circumstances of its beginnings. When we as human beings start making decisions on who should live and who should die, are we not taking over and playing the role of God? Who’s to say that an innocent child conceived out of rape, incest or some other horrific way is not a future leader, medical researcher, teacher, pastor or loving parent to a whole generation of others who will positively influence society? Is the existence of this life, or termination of it, really our choice to make?! Even if the birth mother decides to give the baby up for adoption to a family who desires a child, isn’t that a more humane direction to take than terminating and cutting off such a future? I repeat – Life is Sacred, and we do not have the right to make the decision to grant or take away the life of an innocent child………..

Think about it!

* Real name changed to protect identity

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