The A-List Hollywood Actress Who Became Vehemently Pro-Life Following Her Abortion

Saint Teresa of Calcutta once observed, "It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish." One of the leading actresses of the mid-20th century understood this well. At the age of 18, Jane Russell became pregnant while dating her high school sweetheart. Russell's abortion left her infertile and for the remainder of her life she believed that abortion was wrong under any circumstances, even rape or incest. She described the experience:

The only solution was to find a quack and get an abortion. I had a botched abortion and it was terrible. Afterwards my own doctor said, 'What butcher did this to you?'. I had to be taken to hospital. I was so ill I nearly died. I've never known pain like it.

Note that Ms. Russell said "The only solution was to... get an abortion." Abortion is never a solution. In fact, abortion causes immense physical and emotional damage beginning with the taking of an innocent life. The actress “felt horrible” about the moral evil committed in the abortion, during which she nearly died. Even though she knew it was wrong, as a young teenager, she felt she was trapped. Her acting career was just starting to take off, and her pregnancy was an inconvenience. Russell convinced herself it was the best solution, knowing all along in her heart that it wasn’t. In the days that followed, she scarcely coped.

Fortunately, she found hope and healing in her Christian faith. Russell's daughter later recalled, "Grandma Russell was by her side after she had the abortion and she said, '[T]he Lord will turn this around for good if you allow him to work in your life.'" The actress became passionate about telling others about God's love.

Russell would adopt three children with her husband, and go on to establish the World Adoption International Fund (WAIF) in 1955. Through Russell’s efforts over 40,000 children were placed in permanent homes who may otherwise never have found them. Despite losing her fertility, Jane Russell became a "mother" to many.

Abortion is always gravely evil. In conclusion, here is St.Teresa of Calcutta on abortion's devastating effects on society, and in the lives of men and women:

"America needs no words from me to see how your decision in Roe v. Wade has deformed a great nation. The so-called right to abortion has pitted mothers against their children and women against men. It has sown violence and discord at the heart of the most intimate human relationships. It has aggravated the derogation of the father’s role in an increasingly fatherless society. It has portrayed the greatest of gifts – a child – as a competitor, an intrusion, and an inconvenience. It has nominally accorded mothers unfettered dominion over the independent lives of their physically dependent sons and daughters. And in granting this unconscionable power, it has exposed many women to unjust and selfish demands from their husbands or other sexual partners. 

Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government. They are every human being’s entitlement by virtue of his humanity. The right to life does not depend, and must not be declared to be contingent, on the pleasure of anyone else, not even a parent or a sovereign."