My Plea to Planned Parenthood VP Dawn Laguens

By Jay Hobbs COMMENTARY 15 March 2017

To: Dawn Laguens, Executive Vice President and Chief Brand Officer for Planned Parenthood

Ms. Laguens,

You don’t know me and there’s very little chance you’ve ever heard of me, but in any case, I want to make a public appeal to you.

It’s my sincere hope and ambition to make this plea without a hint of rancor or irony, but rather, from a place of genuine brokenness and an assured hope that the God who made all things is well capable of changing your heart and willing to do just that.

As my wife and I watched your recent interview with Tucker Carlson together last night, I found myself fascinated at just how intent you were to avoid his main question—on the moral value of a human being in her mother’s womb—and return to your main messaging. You want the world to know and believe, as I’m convinced you do (at least to a very high degree) that Planned Parenthood stands for choice and women’s reproductive health care.

When Carlson pressed you to tell him your moral judgment of what, exactly, a preborn human being is, you were on point: “I think that’s up to each individual to decide what they believe, but one in three women in this country have an abortion during their lifetime, and obviously, they are making their own choice. What I’m here to talk about today is that the [GOP healthcare plan] will take away millions of cancer screenings and birth control for women in this country.”

Now, before going further, I need to stop and point out (though I’m certain you already know this) that even the pro-abortion fact-checkers at the Washington Post have debunked the claim that one in three U.S. women get an abortion as a 4-Pinocchio lie—the most dishonest rating they have at their disposal.

Tweet This: A plea to @DawnLaguens: There's room at the table for you. #prolife #PlannedParenthood

The Post was slightly more lenient on the claim that Planned Parenthood offers cancer screenings, tagging it as worthy of 3 Pinocchios just days before your president, Cecile Richards, admitted to Congress that your organization doesn’t do any mammograms at all. Further research has debunked your company’s claims that you offer prenatal care—with one of your site representatives even telling a pregnant woman that your brand name itself is “deceptive” since you’re not really in the business of enabling parenthood.

A tried-and-true adage in public relations is, when you’re going into an interview, you need to proverbially ask the interviewer, “Do you have questions for my answers?” In that sense, Ms. Laguens, your answers were admirable. You stuck to the script far better than I would’ve been able to, I can tell you that much.

Now to the Plea

There are at least two problems with sticking to the script, however. The first is in doing so, you’re dodging the basic moral question: Is what we’re doing right, and if so, how do we know it’s right? Your conviction is that “choice” is the ultimate truth in every pregnancy—namely, the “choice” of whether or not a woman carries or destroys her unborn child. There’s no other way to say this, except to say you’re imperiling your own soul by dodging this question, Ms. Laguens.

If that little human being has been lovingly crafted in the image of God—even, before the point of viability—your participation in destroying this life makes you accountable before the God of Heaven, whether you acknowledge that reality or not.

The second problem with sticking to your script is you know it’s riddled with lies. As we’ve pointed out before, even the most ardent supporters of abortion and Planned Parenthood—not the least of which is your own president—are forced to admit your claims sound far more like the words of Pinocchio than, say, Honest Abe.

I’m not going to lie, Ms. Laguens, there was a part of me that found this interview with Tucker Carlson downright cathartic. In fact, I avoided watching the interview for a day or so because I assumed that catharsis would be all I’d feel and take away from the experience, and I couldn’t rationalize watching it just to pat myself on the back and cheer for Tucker Carlson.

But that’s not my main takeaway, and that’s why I’m writing this letter to you, Ms. Laguens. In truth, as I watched your interview, the scene that came to my mind was that of the Great White Throne.

I pictured you standing before God—“from whose presence earth and sky fled away, and there was no place found for them.” Then I pictured you trotting out your prepared talking points before the God who made you and every one of those 320,000-plus babies your organization killed through abortion in the last calendar year.

I pictured your vain attempt to change the subject before the King of Kings, and I have to tell you, even as I write this, I do it with tears filling my eyes. He’s not going to talk over you like Tucker Carlson, Ms. Laguens. No, the God who made you will call you to account for what you’ve done, and he won’t be interested in the slightest in your pie charts and 1-in-3 mythology.

It won’t matter to the God who spoke the world into existence that 70 percent—or 100 percent—of Americans favor Roe v. Wade. That defense will be meaningless before his throne. He will judge you “according to what [you] have done,” Ms. Laguens. Nothing more, nothing less. Your talking points will be null and void, and daylight will expose your lies.

So I want to plead with you, Ms. Laguens, and anyone else within earshot: Turn from this wickedness at once and receive the grace that God is offering you in his one and only Son.

A Place at the Table

I don’t know your heart, but I know you’re like me. You’ve been made in God’s image and created to bring him glory, yet, like me, you’ve failed to live up to his creative design for you and now find yourself far off from him. You’ve gone your own way, attempted to define your own truth, and become “darkened in [your] understanding and separated from the life of God.”

So have I, Ms. Laguens. I’ve been where you are, ensnared by the devil to do his will. What God is offering to you is freedom from this bondage. More than that, God is offering to reconcile you to himself and include you in his family, giving you a seat at his table.

Notice, I’m not asking you to become a pro-life advocate. I’m begging you to turn from this grave sin of slaughtering the innocent. I’m pleading with you to look to the innocent One who was slain in your place and in mine. Cast yourself on his mercy. Then, reach out for help to those who've walked before you as you embark upon a new path as God’s child.

Tweet This: @PPAct @DawnLaguens talking points are null and void at before the Judge of the Whole Earth #prolife

Ms. Laguens, God has so loved you and me that he paid in full the debt we owe by offering his Son for us. He isn’t just full of love and mercy, he is love, and he is willing that none should perish, but that all should come to the knowledge of the truth.

Won’t you come home, Ms. Laguens? Won’t you embrace this free gift of God? Won’t you lay down your arms, disown your lies and call upon Christ as Lord?

Today, if you hear his voice, please do not harden your heart. Today is the day of salvation.