Sharing My Story

The pastor (Richard Anderson) and elders of Sierra Madre
Congregational Church thought that a committee needed
to be organized (or resuscitated) to deal with Pro-life issues.
One of the single men I was friends with named Terry Beh
(a member of the Singles group) was asked to chair the
committee. I also volunteered to be on the committee
as well as several others. Like all good church committees
this one brainstormed as to it goals and purposes. Under
Terry’s leadership the committee emphasized prayer and
co-ordinating with prolife activities outside the church.
Another major goal was to educate the congregation on
the topic of abortion. The first steps toward education
was to develop a pro-life table that was manned by
memebers of the committtee stationed in front of the
church that gave out literature on abortion and other
life issues (I helped to man the table on a number of
occassions). This education goal, however, was not s
ystematically planned and implemented until several
years later.

The issue of abortion within a local church context
is not as cut and dried as one might think in terms
of attitudes displayed by the church congregation
(members and attenders). Attitudes within a local
church body range from indifference to “let’s not
rock the boat” to how will the community view the
church and its stand about this controversial issue(?)
to being concerned but not wanting to do anything
about it to various degrees of involvement and activism.
For example the pro-life literature table elicited
response from strong support to indifference (“I wish
these people would go away”).