April 6, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) — A former employee of the notorious “House of Horrors” abortionist Kermit Gosnell has spoken publicly about the healing she received through the pro-life movement.
Adrienne Moton, who was imprisoned for her work with Gosnell, appeared alongside Abby Johnson during a talk live-streamed over Facebook yesterday. A former Planned Parenthood director, Johnson is the founder of “And Then There Were None,” a pro-life ministry dedicating to helping abortion workers leave the industry.
This was the first time Moton spoke to a large group about her experiences. Her voice trembled as she explained how she had come to work for Gosnell in the first place. Gosnell, once seen as a benefactor to his local community, was the uncle of one of Moton’s high school friends. When Moton found herself pregnant, Gosnell committed abortions on her. But he and his family also gave her a place to live, and she felt close enough to him to call him “Uncle.” When she decided to bring one of her children to term, the Gosnell family drove her to the hospital and gave her plenty of support.
In 2004, Gosnell asked Moton to work at his clinic. The single mother, not being on good terms with her parents, didn’t have a job or anywhere to stay, so she agreed. She worked for Gosnell for three years and, in Johnson’s words, became his “right-hand gal.”
Moton broke down and wept talking about her worst day at Gosnell’s abortuary.
Her voice trembling, she explained how Gosnell had performed an abortion on a “29.4 weeker” and that she hadn’t been the same since. She prayed over the boy, took his photograph with her phone, covered him up and then put him aside until the doctor came in. Later she wrote him a letter, in which she named him.
“Yes, I gave him a name,” she said to Johnson’s prompting. “I named him Jacob or Jason. It was a J name. And I just felt that I needed to get some type of justice for him.”
Moton was arrested at 5:00 a.m. on January 21, 2011, she recounted. Her arrest was on the day before the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision.
“And that was the best day ever,” she said. “I just felt peaceful. I didn’t have to hide anymore. I just laid it all out. It was the best feeling.”
Moton turned over her phone with its photo of the little boy who had moved her so much, and went to prison for two years.
In her introduction, Abby Johnson recounted that she had watched the Gosnell trial and the reactions of some to the trial’s participants. She was shocked when she witnessed calls for the deaths of Gosnell’s employees.
“I realized then that we have done to the abortion workers what we accuse them of doing to the unborn, and that was dehumanize them,” she said. “We were all caught up in this big dehumanizing circle.”
Wanting Gosnell’s jailed employees to know that there were people in the pro-life movement who loved them, Johnson and her group wrote them letters and prayed for them by name. One day, Johnson got a call from Adrienne Moton. Out of prison but needing help, Moton became a part of Johnson’s ministry.
Moton said that at first she wasn’t comfortable meeting pro-life people but when Johnson told her own story of being an abortion worker, she “opened up a bit.” Then Moton went on a healing retreat with other former abortion workers and found love and acceptance.
“It’s a beautiful thing to know that someone has walked in your shoes and to know that someone loves me for me,” she said. “They don’t throw my past in my face…I’m just so grateful and thankful to God.”
Johnson added that one of the 24 former abortion workers at the retreat had rested her hands on Moton’s shoulders after she talked about her life, and called her their “sacrificial lamb.”
“We were all sinners, and sinners of the same kind,” Johnson said. “But God loves each one of us so much, and He offers us His Mercy.”
Johnson told her hearers that the pro-life movement can’t just be about “saving a baby”: it must be about “conversion of heart.”