By DEXTER DUGGAN
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Imagine if Hillary Clinton were up on the stage telling about her conversion to being a pro-lifer.
That would be quite a transformation for the Democratic presidential nominee, who has made promoting massive abortion a major part of her life.
At the third presidential debate on October 19 in Las Vegas, Clinton determinedly defended late abortions and said she wants a Supreme Court that continues to affirm its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, which imposed permissive abortion nationwide.
But a speaker a few nights later in this Phoenix suburb, at an October 22 benefit dinner for a pro-life pregnancy center, said, “Conversion is possible for anyone. . . . No one is beyond God’s reach.”
She should know. She used to be director of a Texas Planned Parenthood abortion clinic, where “I was responsible for 20,000 abortions,” before her own dramatic conversion in 2009.
Yes, it was Abby Johnson, speaking at Phoenix’s First Way Pregnancy Center annual dinner, whose theme was, “The Stone Not Thrown,” a reference to Jesus’ mercy and forgiveness for the woman caught in adultery.
Johnson said the pro-lifers outside her abortion clinic must have wondered why they kept praying for her because she never was going to change. Then one day, after eight years, she did.
It’s easy to yell at politicians on the television screen, Johnson said, but “we don’t spend enough time on our knees” praying for their conversion.
God would like nothing better “than to see Hillary Clinton come to the foot of the cross” in repentance, Johnson said, but “It’s going to take our sacrifice,” not just an offhanded effort.
Nearly 300 people attended the dinner. They included such public figures as the chief attorney of the area’s prosecutor’s office, the bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Phoenix, and the rector of the diocesan cathedral, whose straightforward homily in early October about Catholics’ political responsibilities went viral.
Johnson said the pro-lifers outside her clinic “may not have saved my physical life, but they saved my eternal life” by praying for her.
The Lord “embraces you, and He says, ‘Neither do I condemn you’ . . . and He’s just waiting to extend that mercy,” she said.
Both Johnson and her husband later became Catholics.
“There was nothing I could ever do to make up for what I had done, but because of Jesus Christ, I didn’t have to,” because of His mercy, she told the dinner.
As for people becoming involved with the abortion industry and working for Planned Parenthood, Johnson said, “It’s a slow decline, it’s a slow slide into a life of sin….It’s one little justification at a time.”
Rather than being an organization concerned with helping women, she said, Planned Parenthood is a big business that wants to keep expanding its customer base.
It offers services like gonorrhea testing and contraception as a way to have a relationship with people who more likely are “participating in high-risk sexual behavior,” Johnson said, so when they return to PP, the organization will have an opportunity to sell them an abortion. “It’s simply a way to get more women in the door. . . .
“They are a marketing and branding machine…and they lie so well that society believes it,” she said.
Earlier in her talk, Johnson said that churches’ avoidance of the abortion issue makes the situation worse. “The easiest woman to sell an abortion to is a Christian woman. . . . Collectively, our silence in the church has really perpetuated the abortion problem in our society.”
Shortly before she left the abortion clinic, Johnson said, “I was instructed that we were going to be doubling our abortion quota.”
A 12-year-old girl taking contraceptives probably has had Planned Parenthood in her school system since kindergarten, preparing the way, Johnson said, with the PP counselor telling youngsters that “your parents are not a safe place to go. You turn to me” when students start to have sexual questions.
The “vast majority” of women who come to pro-life pregnancy centers for help don’t have someone else to turn to, Johnson said, adding: “No matter how that life came to be, no baby is a mistake, and no baby is a sin.”
Phoenix Catholic Diocesan Bishop Thomas Olmsted told the dinner that he was ordained a priest in 1973, the same year that Roe v. Wade was handed down, so he feels he has a special connection to protecting life.
In Grave Danger
Before the dinner began, The Wanderer spoke with a few prominent local figures on hand.
One of them, Fr. John Lankeit, is rector of Olmsted’s cathedral, Saints Simon and Jude. In early October Lankeit delivered a homily that went viral about Catholics’ responsibilities not to vote for pro-abortion candidates and their main political party.
“If you do not know which candidate and party I’m referring to,” the rector’s prepared text said, “then you should not even consider voting until you do know! Ignorance in this area is unacceptable, because ignorance in this area costs millions of babies their lives, and jeopardizes the souls of many Catholic voters.”
On the other hand, he continued, if the voter knows what party and candidate this is and still intends to enable them in “their war on the unborn . . . then it is my duty as a priest to tell you that your soul will be in grave danger, especially if you present yourself for Holy Communion after casting such a vote with the full knowledge of what you’re doing.”
Lankeit told The Wanderer that he received feedback from “a number of different countries,” almost all in support of his stand. “People are saying they feel empowered again. . . . The silence at the pulpits has been heavy for them” to bear.
“I followed what the Holy Spirit was leading me” to say for this homily, as he does when he prepares the readings every week, he said.
A number of news sites ran stories about the homily. At the end of the LifeSiteNews.com article posted October 6 was a link to Lankeit’s full prepared text. The LifeSite story was headlined: “U.S. Priest: Voting for the pro-abort in this election may put ‘your soul…in grave danger’.”
The Wanderer also spoke with Catholic Republican Bill Montgomery, the head of the Phoenix-based Maricopa County Attorney’s Office, one of the nation’s largest public prosecuting agencies. Montgomery also is on the board of directors of the First Way Pregnancy Center.
Left-wing globalist billionaire George Soros has been pouring money into U.S. political races to try to skew them his way, including making donations against Maricopa County Republican Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Montgomery.
Montgomery said Soros spent $1.3 million against him, but “I think I’m gonna be OK” in this November’s election. He added that his Democratic Party foe for county attorney hadn’t even raised $25,000.
Soros is “systematically going after prosecutors around the nation,” Montgomery said.
As for national voting, “I’m praying every day” for a favorable result, Montgomery said, describing this election cycle as “bizarre.”
The recent Project Veritas video revelations about voter fraud confirm that “progressives” are shameless in doing whatever they can to win elections, Montgomery told The Wanderer.
“That has always been the difference between progressives and conservatives, or just right-of-center. . . . Progressives see their cause as worth every effort. . . . There’s no shame in conspiring to undermine our very election system. . . . It’s anathema to the system of government we profess allegiance to,” he said.
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