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Abortion as a Grief Experience

  • Journal of Counseling and Gospel
  • Abbr : Jocag
  • 2007, 8(), pp.89-100
  • DOI : 10.17841/jocag.2007.8..89
  • Publisher : Korean Evangelical Counseling Society
  • Research Area : Humanities > Christian Theology > Pastoral Counseling
  • Received : March 30, 2007
  • Accepted : May 10, 2007

Kwon Oh Gueon 1

1Ph.D., Shepherd University

ABSTRACT

People who undergo an unwanted abortion have a broken spirit. The bereaved needs to experience resurrection of the deceased within their souls and spirits through Jesus Christ who is the resurrection and life. From biblical and theological aspects of abortion, the only reference to abortion in the Old Testament is in Ex. 21:22, which refers to a man who accidentally hurts a woman so that he terminates her pregnancy. The implication is that deliberate termination of pregnancy would be unthinkable. The Lord said, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you for my own”(Jer.1:5). From psychological aspect of abortion, there is the possibility of a guilt response or of psychological depression including somatic distress, guilt feelings, feelings of anger and hostility and change in normal conduct. People who undergo abortion need the (1) release of negative emotions (2) affirmation of the self (3) breaking libidinal ties (4) resurrection of the deceased within the self of the bereaved (5) renewal of relationship (6) rediscovery of meaning on both an emotional and a relational level. If we have painful memories, we can also bring those pains to God in candid, passionate, transformative prayer in lament. Only in God can every soul find the healing, meaning and purpose of his or her being. God is the God of living. “Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive”(Lk20:38).

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