“The Jericho Plan arrived just this morning and I have
already read it from cover to cover . . . . Once again, you
have been instrumental in another miracle!”
Dear Friend,
Thank you for becoming a part of the Church Awareness Project.
You’ll find a link to download your advance copy of the Church Leader’s Kit at the bottom of this page.
But first, please read on to see why this matters, and also about what steps you can take to be part of the Church Awareness Project.
Transform Your Church, Transform the World
The goal of the Church Awareness Project is make churches around the country (and around the world) places of support for unborn children and their grieving parents. Places where every church member recognizes that most abortions are unwanted or coerced, and that abortion exploits and harms all involved. Places committed to upholding the rights and dignity of both the mother and the unborn child. Places where women, men and families who have been devastated by a past abortion can find understanding, support and the healing love that God offers to each of us. Places where those facing crisis pregnancies or at risk of abortion (including unwanted and coerced abortions) will find genuine help that will also empower them to protect the right to life of their unborn child.
If our churches become such healing and supportive places, we will be able to help those hurting in our midst and save both lives and souls. And we can begin to fundamentally transform the debate over abortion in a way that is pro-woman, pro-child, pro-family and pro-life.
How This Project Came About
The Elliot Institute has been a leading post-abortion research and education organization for more than 20 years. During this time, we’ve heard the stories of many, many women and men who have had abortions. We know that many of them have found hope through their local churches or church-supported post-abortion healing ministries.
Many of these same women and men are now reaching out to help others who are hurting, or working as advocates for women and unborn children. As those who have been through abortion and can testify first-hand to the abuse, trauma and devastation that often surrounds this experience, they are among the most eloquent voices speaking up to question the status quo on abortion.
We also know that there are millions of women, men, teens and families facing crisis pregnancies who have received support, resources and practical assistance from pro-life pregnancy ministries–ministries that often depend on financial and other forms of support from local churches. Church support is key to saving lives, providing aid women and families in crisis and helping bring new lives into the world.
Yet there are also many people who feel that they cannot talk about their abortion experiences with those in their church. They may fear being dismissed–told to put it behind them and get on with their lives–or condemned by those around them. Many people may sit in church and never hear a sermon on abortion–or at least not one that acknowledges that most abortions are unwanted or coerced and that abortion not only ends the life of the unborn child but harms everyone involved.
The result is that abortion remains a divisive or taboo issue in many churches. Those who are facing a crisis or out-of-wedlock pregnancy may fear that others in their church will condemn them rather than offering help and support. Those who have had abortions may be left feeling isolated and abandoned. Many may end up leaving the church altogether.
Since the first publication of The Jericho Plan in 1996, we have recognized the important mission churches have to help people find spiritual healing after abortion and be a voice for those who are being abused and exploited by abortion: unborn children and the mothers, fathers and families involved. We have long felt a need to help foster this mission in churches, but our other research, education and outreach efforts have taken up the bulk of our time.
However, we’ve come to realize: we don’t need to do it all on our own!
How You Can Help
This is why we are inviting you to become a part of this effort to transform our churches into places of support, healing and advocacy — an effort which will save lives and souls. You can do this in several ways:
1. Click on the link at the bottom of this page to download the Church Leader’s Kit, which includes a letter to for your pastor or other church leaders, a free copy of The Jericho Plan and other educational materials.
2. Make a pledge to share these materials with your pastor and other church leaders. Having the support of church leaders is crucial to making this effort effective. Let us know you are Sharing the Kit by visiting our Pledge page.
There are a couple of ways to Share the Kit. You can email the entire kit to them, or you can give them the Church Leader’s Letter only by email, mail or in person. Customize the letter or include your own message encouraging them to sign up for the Church Awareness Project.
3. Read these materials yourself and share them with others in your church. Work together to find ways to put some of the ideas in The Jericho Plan into practice in your church.
4. Make a donation to support this work. As a thank you, when you donate $20, or more you’ll receive two printed copies of The Jericho Plan–one for yourself and the other for your pastor or other church leaders. (If you already have a copy, you can donate both copies to leaders in your church). Encourage them to read the book for a blueprint on how to preach on abortion and foster hope and healing in your church.
5. Watch your email in the coming months for further developments on this project. We will be sending out additional resources and will have announcements about other events that will help transform your church!
The proof that this work will change the abortion debate, and save both lives and souls, comes through stories like these:
- “I can only say thank you. You are my best friends; you have saved my life. You have helped my three children to gradually get their mum back. I felt completely lost and I didn’t want to live anymore.
- “You are just great. You gave me the information I needed. … Thank you for making me feel that my tears and my desperation are just the consequences of this experience and the only thing I wanted was to keep my precious baby.”
- “I just want to say I am so thankful for your web site. I have a friend who was considering abortion so I sent her to your web site. She called me around two in the morning, crying. Anyway, it changed her mind. I’ll be praying for your ministry. Thanks so much!”
Thank you very much for becoming a part of this work! With your help, we can transform our churches!
*For donations of $20 or more, we will send you two paperback copies of The Jericho Plan—one for yourself and one to share with your pastor, church and ministry leaders or others in your church. If donating by phone or mail, please include a note or let us know that you would like the books. Please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery.
Another good name would be “Abortion Recovery” day or weekend. it could incorporate everything from individual healing to discussing how to recover the entire culture from abortion and why we need to with regard to the aftermath on individuals and society as a whole. This brings everyone into the picture, for prevention of abortion, to forgiveness and healing of those involved, to testimonies of those who have been forgiven and healed and education for the entire congregation, especially the youth. There could be an entire weekend with workshops for all agegroups to teach age appropriate pro-life info and a good way for families to take the time to come together in their church communities to affirm life from the God of life.
thank you. God Bless
Not a day goes by that I think about the day that I got the procedure done. It has been 3 years and I still think about it. I never had anyone to talk to about it and now since my sister had her daughter, its been taking effect on me bad and it hurts. I love my niece but now I regret what I did and there is nothing I can do about it 🙁
Dear Alisha, I am sorry for your loss. There is something you can do about it. There is hope and healing after abortion. I encourage you to attend a Project Rachel retreat that will help you with this process. They have retreats nationwide. Please visit the website. The retreats are confidential, non judgmental and there is financial help available if needed. God Bless you. You have my prayers. http://www.project-rachel.net/
Alisha,
There is a Bible study called Surrendering the Secret. I took it at our local pregnancy center. It provided great healing for me. My abortion was 25+ years ago. Don’t wait as long as I did to seek healing. If nothing else, do it for your niece so you can having a wonderful relationship with her as she grows up. God bless.
Alisha – I am so sorry for your loss. That is among the many, many heartbreaking things about this, from “pre-abortion” to “post,” that so much personal and profound heartache is swept under the rug or dismissed by society and women often do not have others to share their grief, comfort or encourage them, or acknowledge the tangled web of abortion.
Please know that there are people who do care and care deeply. We can’t bring back your child or fully understand your loss, but we care. Hopefully, this project will help raise awareness a little and people will tune in a little more to those in their own circles.
Every situation is different but “forbidden grief” makes it so much harder. For resources, people and encouragement plus tips for help, see http://www.theunchoice.com/healing.htm
God bless you, Alisha, in this journey. You are not alone.
hi,
I kinder dont know what to say or how… but i lost my child due too a silly abortion when i was a 17, iam now 21 and regret my decision with my whole entire heart… it aches of knowing i am missing my little human being, i still to this day wonder how i may have hurt the father of the child we are no longer together and thats fine too. i have a wonderful partner and soon want to start a family… we have been trying without any luck at all its breaking my heart too feeling alone but as i read alishas comment i realise i am not that alone i ve know other females to have gotten three or four abortions and think nothing of it i had one and it has effected my life big… as alisha said who sister has had a child since then and same as my YOUNGER brother and he was only 17 and had the support from my mother, where when i had g though with the procedure i was alone and already made my stupid mind up, i can never seem to forgive myself and as i look at the date i realise that next month it will be 4 year exactly too that day i took gods work in my hands and paid somebody to make my life as normal… as little as i knew today it would be the big and utterly silly think i have ever made. my body is missing something my mind and soul is searching arather… deep down i cover it up with laughter and happiness when deep deep down my whole heart is shuttered.
thank you for listening or reading it has brought great pain too me for i now reside in the city in which i did what i did four years ago almost like he or she was calling me here i know that may sound silly but after all murder was taking place that day 🙁 xo
i guess forgivness is the only way and forgetting just is not an opition here.
so sorry too carry on.
I am the Client Services Director for the local Crisis Pregnancy Center and also a recovering and healing post abortion woman, 30 years past. Yes, 30 years ago when abortion was not even legal except in California where I was raised. I was 13, I was raped by the high school boy us the street, but I was also being physically and mentally abused by my father. I have to say at that time, knowing so little about my body or life in general I did not consider anything other than I was more afraid of my father than God at that time.
As I have gone through extreme healing the last 13 years, I realized not only did I blame all of my problems on my father, the abuse, the rape and the feeling of abandonment. When I gave my heart back to the Lord and the healing began I realize I had hidden and denied the truth of what I had done. Since that time, I believe the Lord has given me a name for my little girl (Phoebe Grace) and I have just recently gone through a memorial service to mentally, emotionally, and physically admit the fact that I gave my little girls life away, but I do believe she is in heaven.
Now I spend each day at the center giving truth to those which find themselves pregnant and counseling those that grieve over the loss they have suffered. I have only a couple more years to finish my doctorate in Christian Mental Health Counseling and I plan to use the knowledge given me to help others heal, in the name of Jesus.
Keep up the good work, I am sharing yours with many
I am sorry for your past abuses and the tragic loss of your baby, but I trust that she is in the care of a loving God. It’s also encouraging to know there are people like you out there in the counseling profession. This is so needed to deal with the prelude to and aftershock of abortion that is so pervasive among us. God bless you in your work!
we are each uneque with many facets attached a story to share. Just been diagnosed with PTSD AND PAS not only from my medical proceedure but from the abuse and betrayal spat at in my church and put on trail i shared with my pastors wife and then as i wept and flashed back to my nightmare a christian sister later in another place asked if i wanted prayer and when i stood and closed my eyes she put fists in my stomack in the name God and spoke into my motherhood I rolled on the floor in agony. i came to and she had gone. i asked God what was that and received wolf in sheeps clothing beware. i picked myself up and went home. every noise alerted me i became unabel to drive go out alone fear engulfed. i left church. isolated i dare not share as doctors told me to leave their surgery i went from on practice to another . previous i had tried suicide and had to keep all this secret i became unable to work function. I did not attent church but prayed for others though i coulndt find them. i prayed they would find Jesus and know him as i did i knew no one by name but knew someone who did God.so i stood in the gap and prayed for men and women doctors church clinic and government.
i felt abused violated raped from the procedure and pondered these few cells they told me about. in my heart in my spirit my soul i knew she was female and i searched every where for her in my days awake and dreams and nightmares. those who have journey will have knowledge. Then one evening after the abuse in church i called out to God . God you know me and my heart and my life and my loss but what man and immediately I hear a name and write it down. the next day I wake at dawn and watch the sun rise and knew somehow i would find this man for God had given me this name i would seek him.
Bible in hand i await time to dress i had been wounded and i drive across town and see a church steeple and enquire but he is not there but he is known and i collapse on the floor and this kind man picks me up and carries me to safety. He makes a phone call and he offers to take me. But i say God is with me for he has spoken. I find the address and even a parking space right outside and then two women come to meet me and hold out their arms to help me and they say we have been waiting for you. amazed i share my story i find safety they listen no abuse here. i find the man and he is off to africa in an hours time i release him to go for i was received it was a christian counselling house. sharing my story of heartcry and grief and loss this woman shares God calls each by name do you want to know the name God calls your child i say yes yes i know she is female i alwys knew in my heart . we pray in agreement. then i am told have a pen and paper and when God reveals the name you will never ever forget it.
so i return home so greatful someone listen to my story and no abuse then i sit compleplate had she have grown what would i have called her i write the name Catherine down and view it then i think a more modern style when i hear a great wind rustling outside my home then the wind came through the walls of my lounge and the wind blew around the room on the wind was a name Hannah I wrote the name down and then i stood and danced around the house she was as if reborn to me. i have two sons and a daughter in heaven God calls her Hannah. I wanted to shout it from the roof tops and on the height of Blackpool Tower. I rejoiced dance praised God she is safe in God with all the other unborn.
i shared my story with other women and some came to me for prayer some still born some miscarried some as Hannah. We prayed to God for revelation and each received the name God calls child. then a time in towns and cities women and men came to me arms outstretched sharing their stories i was instructed to listen and in obediance God happened.
i chose to forgive those who hurt wounded me and then a time period came and God said now forgive yourself. so in obediance i am trying and ask god to help me. i see this young mother trying to raise her two earthly children and i have now compassion for her the woman she once was.
Time and seasons are Gods and now the doctors are now understanding but in my experience not the church they are not listening. But i am praying to be received. you expose the lie and deception and it exposes you. it may be safer to write a book each unique many facets attached. i pray men and women will come to know God calls each by name and receive revellation. It takes time to heal it is a journey into God and His son Jesus. i stand in the gap for all of you .