By Katie Yoder
Washington D.C., Aug 12, 2021 / 18:00 pm
Planned Parenthood blacklists employees who recognize the humanity of the unborn and “does not refer to any unborn baby as a ‘baby,’” according to a former manager of the organization.
Now a pro-life advocate, Sue Thayer responded to a new book by Dr. Leana Wen, a former president of Planned Parenthood, during EWTN Pro-Life Weekly on Aug. 5. Wen’s memoir, “Lifelines: A Doctor's Journey in the Fight for Public Health,” offers an insider’s look into the nation’s largest abortion provider. Among other things, Wen confirmed that Planned Parenthood board members condemned her approach of focusing on public health instead of politics.
That’s why Thayer said she wasn’t surprised when Wen, the first physician to head Planned Parenthood, was fired in 2019 after serving for eight short months.
“She wrote, I think it was July of 2019, this heartfelt op-ed piece about her own miscarriage and she said in there that her son had lost a little brother or sister,” Thayer said, recalling a Washington Post story that Wen wrote. “The second I read that, I thought, ‘Uh-oh, she is not going to be there long because Planned Parenthood does not refer to any unborn baby as a ‘baby.’
“They call them everything else,” Thayer emphasized, “and so when I saw that, I thought she's going to probably be toast one way or another because they just will not – they will not tolerate the humanity of it.”
While Wen supports abortion, “showing that mama's heart” in her op-ed was “probably the final straw,” Thayer said.
One of Wen’s more shocking revelations came when she admitted that people at Planned Parenthood instructed her to say “abortion” in “every media interview.” Thayer noted Planned Parenthood’s abortion-centric evolution.
“In the early years that I worked there, through the 90s and even the early 2000s, they talked about making abortion safe, legal, and rare. That was kind of their mantra,” she said. “Now, of course, it's ‘free on demand and without apology.’”
Thayer guessed that during Wen’s time at Planned Parenthood, she “got a full taste of just how rabidly pro-abortion they are.” While she knew Wen backs abortion, Thayer said that “there are different levels of the craziness.”
Thayer, who now serves as director of outreach for the pro-life group 40 Days for Life, offered her advice on how to best reach out to those who work in the abortion industry.
“Pray. I think that's the best thing,” she said. “Try to plant seeds in workers. If you're at a 40 Days for Life vigil, you're just out on the sidewalk praying and you have an opportunity to show kindness to a worker, whether it's just a smile or a wave.”
She particularly asked for prayers for Wen.
“Pray for Dr. Wen. Pray that her heart would be softened towards life,” she said. “I know personally from working there, and how lost and misguided I was, that no one is out of God's reach.”
She stressed that those who work in the abortion industry are loved by God, too.
“We know that every worker is a child of God,” she said. “He loves them just like he loves all of us and it's our job to just show the love of Jesus Christ, then leave the results to him.”
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“All of our actions together make a huge difference and God is orchestrating this whole big picture and it's just such an honor to be a little tiny part of it,” Thayer concluded. “We all have a job and we just have to figure out what God wants us to do.”
