As I read Kay Ohana’s letter entitled “Do pro-lifers just see life from a man’s perspective?” I was deeply saddened and quite insulted and felt the need to respond to her many false statements and assertions. I realize that this may come as a shock to Ms. Ohana, since she wrongly stated that the “majority of the pro-lifers are male,” but I am the familiar face of the pro-life movement in this country. I am young, I am female, I am Catholic, and I assure you, I am not alone.

I am not quite sure where Ms. Ohana studied women’s history. But it is painfully obvious that she has been severely short-changed. The early feminists and suffragists like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton were staunch pro-life advocates and considered abortion to be a grave injustice suffered by women which resulted in a lack of equality for women. Their writings on this subject are well documented.

I am very sorry that Ms. Ohana grew up with a father that would say something so ridiculous as, “women should be kept pregnant and barefoot.” But, allow me to tell you about the kind of father I had. My father raised me to believe that I have inherent worth and value as a woman. He taught me to celebrate my femininity in its entirety, including my fertility. He taught me not to treat my body with disgust, or to feel compelled or pressured to turn my body into a medical lab experiment for pharmaceutical companies by stuffing it, patching it, shooting it, surgically removing healthy functioning parts of it, or chemically turning it inside out, at the increased risk of blood clots, strokes, or cancer, just because some immature male might find my fertility gets in the way of his “good time.” In essence, he taught me to love being a woman and I do.

I find Ms. Ohana’s assertion that Catholic men are “terrified of women controlling their own wombs” very bizarre. I have been a practicing Catholic woman for over 35 years. I have yet to meet any priest or bishop or read anything from a priest or bishop suggesting in the slightest way that they regard women with less dignity and are terrified. In fact, the Catholic Church is often criticized for honoring a woman who did exactly this — made a choice to control her own womb.

But I must say, the most disturbing part of Ms. Ohana’s letter was when she referred to a child with special needs as a “defective” life. I have a very good friend that volunteers much of his precious time working with these amazing people with the DREAM group here in Kalispell. As he will tell you, the people he has the pleasure of working with add much more to his life than he will ever be able to give in return. I can only thank God their parents didn’t view these precious lives with such chilling disdain and I would suggest Ms. Ohana spend time with special needs individuals. It would benefit her greatly. I must say her terminology is reminiscent of another era — Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Hitler and other eugenicists frequently referred to special needs people as “unfit” and ultimately had them sterilized and then killed. I wonder if Ms. Ohana would disagree?

Ms. Ohana states that “none of this has to do with religious freedom, as in your religious ignorance you can choose to use these services offered or not.” I can only assume that Ms. Ohana is referring to the Health and Human Services mandate proposed by the Obama administration. To demand, that we as a nation, hand over our money and our conscience (and the money and conscience of a church that is morally opposed) even if that means that poor people will go without services they need, homeless people will go without shelter, sick people will go without care, the elderly will go without assistance, and children will go without education because Catholic organizations will be forced to shut down is outrageous.

This mandate is an attack against the free exercise of religion of all people and a violation of conscience, which is an attack on human dignity; a dignity which transcends all religious bounds, a dignity natural to every person, a dignity that has been recognized by our own Constitution. This is not simply a “religious” debate but an attack, so extreme, and so intellectually dishonest, it should make every U.S. citizen outraged. This total disregard for the protection of conscience is unprecedented in our history.

In our country, women have the ability to obtain contraception at a very low cost and often times, at no cost. Why in the world does our federal government find it necessary to mandate that organizations who are morally opposed pay for that which is so readily and easily obtainable in virtually every pharmacy in every city? Who is forcing who, Ms. Ohana?

Although I fail to see how Ms. Ohana thinks it logical to equate the awesome power of a woman in being a co-creator of life with the improper functioning of a penis, we do agree on one thing. Every child DOES have the right to be loved. But I would make the distinction that every child also has the right to be welcomed, not “wanted.” As a female of Jewish descent, I am critical of the concept that one person’s existence should depend on someone else “wanting” her.

Women and men in the pro-life movement work to foster a community in which every child is welcomed and loved and the best way to accomplish this goal is to focus on their mothers and to promote adoption. We need to offer women, who find themselves alone and isolated in a crisis pregnancy, a loving solution, not the violent, traumatic “choice” of abortion. Women deserve to be loved and supported, not dropped off at some clinic by some overgrown adolescent who can’t be bothered to take care of the child he just made, all while he hides comfortably under the banner of “choice.”

From my perspective as a woman — women and children deserve better than abortion.

Brower is a resident of Whitefish.