A True Story: When Fear Kills

She sat across from me, hands trembling, eyes downcast, her breath uneven as she struggled to find the words. I had known her for years—watched her grow in the faith, encouraged her in trials, and prayed for her like a daughter. But today, she wasn’t just a young woman in my church; she was someone carrying a weight too heavy for her shoulders.

Tears welled in her eyes as she finally spoke. “Pastor, I need to tell you something… I... I messed up.” Her voice broke, and for a long moment, she couldn’t continue.

I waited, knowing that whatever she was about to say, it wasn’t easy for her. She had always looked up to me, and because our church had never been silent about the value of life, she wasn’t just crushed by the sin of premarital sex—she was crushed by the thought of disappointing me.

“I got pregnant,” she finally said, barely above a whisper. The words left her like a confession of guilt, like she expected my face to harden, my posture to shift in anger. But how could I be angry? Yes, sin has consequences, and she had sinned, but life—every life—is a gift from the Lord. Thousands of couples engage in sexual immorality every day and never conceive. But God, in His providence, had given her a child. That wasn’t a curse—it was grace in the midst of failure.

She looked up briefly, searching my face, and I think the absence of condemnation in my eyes assured her. But then, a new wave of grief overtook her, and her shoulders shook under its weight.

“It doesn’t matter now,” she choked out. “Because he… he took the baby away.”

She told me she believes he slipped her the abortion pill. She never consented, never even knew. But in his fear, he decided for her. He decided for their child.

I never met the young man, but I saw the evidence. She showed me his desperate texts and emails from after he confessed and she broke up with him. He begged for forgiveness. He panicked at what he had done. He knew. And in one of those messages, it was clear—he was afraid. Afraid of the child. Afraid of responsibility. Afraid of exposure.

Fast forward several months, and I would need to step in to write to him to never contact her again.

Even after destroying the life of his own child, even after betraying the woman he claimed to love, he wouldn’t let go. He didn’t want the guilt, didn’t want the weight of his actions. He wanted her to absolve him. He wanted her to make it go away.

But it wouldn’t go away. The blood of the innocent cries out to God.

And now, she sat before me, broken, ashamed, and grieving—not just her sin, but his. Not just the unexpected pregnancy, but the unexpected loss. Not just the weight of her failure, but the weight of his cowardice.

She had been given a child, and then had that child ripped from her without her voice, without her choice, without her ability to fight back. And because of that, she wept harder than I had ever seen.

I wanted to take that grief from her, to bear it myself, but I couldn’t. Only Christ could. So I did the only thing I could do—I reminded her of the cross. I reminded her that there is forgiveness for sin, that there is healing for grief, and that Jesus, more than anyone else, understood what it meant to have the innocent suffer at the hands of others.

She had lost a child. She had been betrayed by the one who should have protected her. But she was not beyond hope. The blood of Christ speaks a better word than the blood of Abel, and it speaks a better word than the blood of her baby.

I reached across the table, took her shaking hands in mine, and prayed—not just for her healing, but for justice. Not just for her comfort, but for the repentance of the man who had taken what was not his to take. Not just for the weight of her sorrow to be lifted, but for the day when no woman will ever have to sit across from a pastor and weep because the man she trusted stole the life of her child.

Could she make a case? Could he be prosecuted? It’s doubtful.

Under current Kentucky law, men can pressure, intimidate, and manipulate women into abortion with no real consequences. A woman being threatened, shamed, or deceived into taking an abortion pill often has nowhere to turn. If a man physically assaults her, he can be charged. If he forces pills into her body, he can be prosecuted. But if he pressures her relentlessly, isolates her, or makes her believe she has no other choice, the law remains silent.

Because self-managed abortion is legal for the mother, a man can easily evade justice. He doesn’t need to raise his voice or lift a hand—he only needs to order the pills, leave them on the counter, and remind her what will happen if she doesn’t take them. She is left alone to carry the burden while he walks away free.

This is not justice. This is not protection. This is a legal system that abandons the most vulnerable and emboldens the guilty.

Equal protection legislation matters because it ends the legal double standard—one that allows abortion to continue in secret while pretending Kentucky has abolished it. If we truly care about protecting women, we must close these loopholes.

If we believe in justice, if we believe in the sanctity of life, then we must act now.

The time is now. Let us stand.