Saturday, June 09, 2007

Whatever is excellent: Planned Parenthood

Prolifers have been bombarding the blogosphere with posts noting the evil that Planned Parenthood boasts about in its recently-released 2006 Annual Report.

However, in light of my recent commitment to Philippians 4:8 (Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.) I want to take a moment to point out what is admiralable, excellent, or praiseworthy.

PLEASE let me make this clear: I do not think that PP is a benevolent presence in our society. I need not go into this at length. I just don't want to be misunderstood. I don't want this taken as an endorsement of PP. It's just an act of obedience. Scriptures tell us to look at what is lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy, etc. That would mean that we're to look on it wherever it's found. If we see God as the source of all that is good, that means that God can use even an organization as destructive as Planned Parenthood to work good, if we let him.

So, with that understood.

In 2005, Planned Parenthood put clinical resources into cancer screening and prevention, including pap smears, breast exams, colonoscopies, and cryotherapy procedures. I can't figure out how they caluclated what percent went into what sort of activity. Is this percent of appointments? Percent of fees collected? Percent of resources allocated? I have no idea.

Now, we can choose to simply dismiss this. After all, Ted Bundy met Ann Rule while they were saving lives on a suicide hotline, and he once rescued a toddler from drowining, right? Was that enough to redeem him?

Well, no. Only Jesus could redeem Ted Bundy. Just as only Jesus can redeem any of us.

But David "Son of Sam" Berkowitz repented and now has a prison ministry. Nobody is beyond God's reach. And I am open to the idea that this might include organizations as wells as individuals. God might choose to redeem Planned Parenthood rather than destroy it. And considering the massive infastructure they have in place, this could be an awesome thing.

Jonah 3:5 The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.


Let's not risk being like Jonah, so obsessed with seeing God destroy the wicked that we're incapable of rejoicing when they repent. If the people of Ninevah could get their heads out of their asses and get their act straight, surely Planned Parenthood is not beyond redemption.

A couple of times as I wrote this entry, I started to describe PP as "corrupt" except that to be corrupt, it would have to have started out with a benevolent purpose and turned awry. Whereas PP started out as Margaret Sanger's drive to treat people like stray animals that need to be kept from breeding. Which means, paradoxically enough, that the cancer screening and other benevolent services are actually a corruption, if you will, of PP's original purpose.

If you look at it from that perspective, it gives you one of those "Whoa!" moments. Goodness has been infiltrating an organization that was founded for evil purposes. Think of that a moment. Think of what that means.

And pray about what God wants you doing about PP. I know that posting this has been an eye-opener for me. Though I don't know yet what I'm gonna be doing about it.

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