...The infighting has been her biggest surprise since joining the pro-life movement, she says.
"There are all these different facets of the movement [that] just argue constantly and that has been really disheartening for me," Johnson says. "People ask me if I've been hit hard by pro-choicers, and I say no, I've been hit hard by pro-lifers."
Despite her criticism of some pro-life groups and centers, Johnson offers praise for the 40 Days for Life campaign—an around-the-clock silent protest outside abortion clinics. She watched the first campaign take place at her own clinic in Bryan in 2007 and now holds up the silent protest as the ideal model.
While working for Planned Parenthood, Johnson and her now-husband applied for membership to a pro-life, Baptist church. When they were told she wouldn't be accepted for membership because of her job at Planned Parenthood, they moved on.
"I think too often in the Christian faith we miss out on opportunities to reach out to people that are walking down a very destructive path," she says. "There was no offer for ministry, there was no, 'We'd like to talk to you about what you're doing.'..."
While Johnson says she feels called to the Catholic Church, her decision has also highlighted another division she feels exists in the pro-life movement: lack of cooperation between Catholics and Protestants. She says her scheduler tells her that some pro-life groups won't invite her to speak because she's Catholic.
"While we're worried about denominational infighting, babies are dying and women are getting hurt and that just breaks my heart," she says. "God didn't create denominations; we did..."
, a 152-page memoir published by Tyndale and Focus on the Family (there is also an edition from Catholic publisher Ignatius Press
)....
.) And, in the meantime, buy Abby's book
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