Project Rachel: Finding New Compassion : Catholic Women Who Have Had Abortions Aided in Reconciliation

The 24-year-old woman with a substance abuse problem came to Stephen Lynott for help.

She was pregnant, alone and angry after being abandoned by her boyfriend and thrown out of her parents’ home, recalled Lynott, director of Catholic Social Services for the Marquette Diocese.

While counseling the woman, Lynott found out she had ended two earlier pregnancies. Part of her substance abuse problem came from her effort to erase the painful memory of the abortions.

Because of her abortions, Lynott said, the woman expected condemnation from the Roman Catholic Church. Instead, she was surprised to find compassion.

Change in Approach

It might have been condemnation before 1985, when the diocese began a program to teach counselors and priests how to help women who have had abortions.

Named for a biblical story about a woman who grieved inconsolably for her children, Project Rachel treats women more like mourners than sinners.

Before that, an average of one or two Catholic women a month who defied church opposition to abortion came to Lynott’s agency for help. Counselors, unaware of the women’s abortions, sometimes were unable to spot what was troubling them.

“We didn’t know how to begin,” Lynott said. “It was an utterly foreign concept.”

Vickie Thorn, the founder of the first Project Rachel, which began in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee in 1984, said feelings of remorse are not confined to Catholic women.

‘Generic Human Guilt’

“I don’t think it’s Catholic guilt,” she said. “I think it’s just generic human guilt.”

The National Conference of Catholic Bishops endorsed the concept of post-abortion reconciliation services such as Project Rachel in 1985, according to the Rev. John Gouldrick, director of the bishops’ Pro-Life Office.

At least 60 Catholic dioceses in the United States have started Project Rachel programs because of estimates that as many as 30% of Catholic women have had abortions, Thorn said . It’s about the same proportion as the general population, she added.

Howard Hoeflein, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Detroit, said the numbers are not surprising, despite the church’s position that abortion except to save the life of the mother is a serious sin.

“Usually, when a decision on abortion is made, it is within a framework of a lot of pressures being exerted on the woman,” Hoeflein said. “The church is just one element. It may be a situation that is overwhelming.

‘One Bad Decision’

“What we’re trying to do is make sure that because of one bad decision, they don’t just throw away the stabilizing influence of the church on the rest of their lives.”

Lynott said, “We had one woman who came in the day after her abortion. It was a very, very tough situation. Another woman waited 20 years. You’re dealing with awareness and you’re dealing with denial. What triggers that, what opens that door, you can’t really predict.

“Some want to talk about their experience and that’s a very gut-wrenching experience. Some are right up front. They know where their pain is. The younger clients, you may have to dig a little bit more.”

Pro-choice organizations say they doubt that many women are modern-day Rachels who regret ending their pregnancies.

“The guilt they feel is guilt society imposes on them, and the Catholic Church are masters at imposing guilt on women,” said Kate Michelman, executive director of the National Abortion Rights Action League.

It’s ‘Anti-Christian’

“To try to cause women to feel guilt when they have already had to struggle with such a difficult situation is in fact anti-Christian,” she said.

Raised as a Catholic but no longer an active member of the church, Michelman had an abortion after bearing three children.

“What I ended up feeling guilty about was not feeling guilty,” she said. “I made one of the most moral decisions I ever made in my life.”

A study published in 1974 indicated that up to 91% of women report a sense of relief following abortion, while a 1976 study indicated that up to 98% had no regrets and would make the same choice again, she said.

Project Rachel counselors said that husbands, boyfriends and grandparents, feeling anger or guilt over a family member’s abortion, also call, as do non-Catholics.

Link to Abortion

Thorn said that eating disorders, substance abuse and inability to mother children later are often linked to an earlier abortion. But Michelman said the U.S. Surgeon General found no evidence that women suffer psychological or emotional problems after abortion.

While some seek professional counseling through the program, others ask to talk to a sympathetic priest to seek forgiveness, Thorn said. “They want to get straight with God.”