ARTICLES

NEWS

ROAMIN' CATHOLIC

Contents © 1998
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.

I'll Be Back

EDWARD ALLRED N THE PULPIT

By Christopher Zehnder

"I can't understand why she would place that burden on those of us who provide this service -- tremendous burden." So said abortion clinic magnate, Dr. Edward Allred, of a woman seeking a second trimester abortion. It may seem unbelievable, but that was not the first time that night that the owner of the abortion clinic chain, Family Planning Associates, referred to the struggle he experienced in performing second trimester abortions. Indeed, that was not the only struggle to which he admitted that night.

"That night" was 15 years ago, September 10, 1984. Allred was addressing a group of pro-life Christians at a non-denominational church called His Nesting Place, in Downey. A strange venue for an abortionist -- especially since His Nesting Place is dedicated to providing a home to unwed mothers to save them from another alternative: abortion.

How did it happen that Edward Allred should wind up with such a group, in such a place? Pastor Al Howard, pastor of His Nesting place, said it came about through his personal contact with Allred. "I've been sidewalk counseling at one of his clinics for 15 years. When he opened his clinic in Downey, I was there, and I formed a group of people to try and stop this clinic from coming in." Allred, says Pastor Howard, would not remain aloof from the protesters. "He would always call me over when he saw me. I've talked to him maybe four or five times, for as long as an hour at a time, witnessed to him, you know, talked to him about the Lord. If you didn't know him, he's a real mild-mannered, grandfatherly type fellow.

"One day when we were talking, he said, 'I know your side, I know what you believe and why you believe it. But you people know nothing about me and why I do what I do. You would never let me come and speak, never let me share with you from my perspective.'"

Pastor Howard relates that Allred was initially slated to speak at another church in Santa Monica. Allred came, but things did not turn out as expected. "The pastor and the board pulled a fast one on him," said Pastor Howard. "They originally said he could come and speak in the church, and then they decided that he had to speak in the basement, not in the church. And they decided that he had to sit through a service, before he would be allowed to speak. None of this was agreed upon by him, so he got very angry, and came to me afterwards and said, 'You people not only do not keep your word, you're not honest.' I said I had no control over what happened because it wasn't my own church. Then I made him the same offer, saying, 'You could come to my church, and I guarantee that we will hear you out and that won't happen.' That's how he happened to speak at my church."

What was the audience's reaction to Allred at His Nesting Place? "Very good," said Pastor Howard. "I distinctly remembered that he said, 'I really enjoyed coming to your church. One of these days you're going to look up from your pulpit and you're going to see me come in. I'll be back.' Course, he hasn't come back, but who knows?"

Pastor Howard says that he has "never heard of anyone interviewing an abortionist." Speaking at Howard's church, Allred occupied the place of honor -- the pulpit. Howard says that "one of the main reasons" he had Allred come "was because I wanted to have this on tape, believing that, someday, it might have value."

And value it has, for those who would understand the foremost abortion provider in California. Allred addressed many topics that night of September 10. The impression of Allred I received from reading the transcript of his talk is not of a callous man, entirely devoid of remorse, conscienceless. One senses, rather, the fading of an internal struggle in a soul, even then after over 25 years of killing, not fully at rest with itself.

Allred spoke of his religion. "I was raised, basically, as a Methodist," he said, "and was the kind of a kid that went to church, basically every Sunday, until I got into high school and then thought [I] was too smart to do that. And then, I started attending the Seventh Day Adventist Academy high school, and through that experience, ultimately, became a Seventh Day Adventist."

Allred said, that though he did not attend church regularly, he still thought himself a believer in Christ: "I'm not really proclaiming myself to be a Christian, in the sense that I'm sure a lot of you folks are... do I accept, basically, Christ as God's son?... I have a -- some sort of an unfulfilled longing to return to some sort of religious, a more formal type of, religious program... I do try to -- I'm not a deep Bible student--but I do try and, several times a week, to read the Bible and to do things like that. I watch James Robison, and I watch -- believe it or not, one of my favorite preachers, even though I consider him to be somewhat of a showman, and I'm not totally certain that he's on the level, although I hope that he is, is Jimmy Swaggart."

It was in connection with his religion, that Allred displayed uneasiness. He stated that at one time in his life he "thought seriously" about becoming an Adventist minister; however, "it would have been a disaster," he said, "because I personally cannot be the kind of moral example in other parts of my life that I would have needed to be." Later, he said that he was not what his alma mater, Loma Linda University, "had in mind when Mrs. White started the medical school and told us all to go out and go to Africa and do all the things...

"I really would not want to have the Adventist Church be burdened with me now. Not so much because of my abortion activities, but for other reasons. And I really have not attended church on any kind of a regular basis for about 15 years. I do occasionally attend church, usually not an Adventist church. The last church I attended was about a year ago, and it was a conservative, or an orthodox, Presbyterian church. I would never attend a church that was a member of the World Council of Churches because I'm philosophically opposed to almost everything that they do."

Allred's professed lack of compunction over being an abortionist is not entirely convincing. When Pastor Howard asked Allred if he ever thought about what people alive "20 years from now"on account of being saved from an abortion would think of him if they knew "that on some certain date there was an appointment made for you to dispose of them for $300, the abortionist said he didn't think of it -- "I don't think of the responsibility for the decision to make abortion as being my responsibility... some would say, 'Well, that's what the Germans said,' and everything. Well, first of all, I don't consider the issues at all to be applicable. But the responsibility is in the mother, potential mother, and I would hope, also, the other partner...

"I--I have thought of it in these terms. I have a wonderful brother, who is quite a bit younger than I. And, I think the most marvelous man I've ever known. And he's 31 years old, so I guess he's 16 [or 17] years younger than I am. He's a physician, in Oregon, and he's been a great joy to me, and a great influence on our family. And, as far as I know, he's never done anything wrong. When he was a little boy, he never cried, he was a wonderful... just, amazing person. I mean, I just can't say enough about him! And he's a joy to me and a great inspiration to me, even to this day. And, by the way, he would probably never do an abortion, for his own reasons. He has three wonderful children... But my mother was in very poor health at that time. Having a child was enormously risky. It was way past the time when her, you know, her family -- you know, when there were three of us already, and she should never have had it. And, in those days, of course, abortion was quite difficult, if not impossible. Oh, it wasn't totally impossible... But I thought of that. The very question, of what if things were coming along now, I'm sure Mom would have had an abortion."

Though a strong supporter of "abortion rights," Allred stated that he is not a "liberal." A supporter of President Reagan (though he wished the president had not been pro-life), Allred said, "I have some fairly strong political beliefs. I consider myself to be quite a conservative American... I am a pretty dedicated Republican as a matter of fact, and, I think, a pretty substantial contributor to the Republican Party. But I don't give to the Republican Party for any personal gain or for any reasons of trying to influence their activities on abortion. I seldom, if ever, have addressed a politician about this particular issue, even when I've been close to him and have known him very well. And I'm not particularly one who is in support of public funding of abortion."

Being conservative, Allred stated that he is "just as critical of these absurd, ultra-leftist feminists that give out these things about the back-alley abortions..." While he admitted that "there were some back-alley abortions, and I've seen at County Hospital many of those, in the old days," Allred stated that the problem was not "as great, anywhere near the extent [the feminists] are talking about. They're as absurd in one way as the -- another group is on the other way. And that's the kind of emotionally based argument that I really detest, frankly."

Though opposed to public funding, Allred stated that he supported legal abortion because he was "very concerned about population trends... We do have a population problem in the world." These problems, connected with over-population, he said, "threaten worldwide instability, revolution, starvation, all kinds of things."

Yet, though he seemed to think abortion instrumental in controlling population, Allred regretted that it was used "as a means of birth control, when, really, that's not what it's intended to be." Ironically, Allred admitted that very few abortions are performed for reasons more noble than birth control. "I'm not saying," said Allred, "that the majority of our patients come to us because they have some terrible physical problem. That would not be the truth." In fact, according to Allred, the number of such cases is "relatively small..., probably five percent or less." "I think that most people have abortions because of social convenience."

So, if Allred thought most abortions were sought for the wrong reason, why did he say he continued to perform them? He never clearly said why. At one point he tried to turn the table on pro-life advocates saying that, "aside from the one that's doing the abortions and the fetus, there's also a young woman, a woman. And you're forgetting, in all of your discussion, you never mentioned her rights, if she has any. Does she--is she required to provide her body as a nurturing ground, during this time, for something that she does not wish to have? Do you honestly believe you can make her do that?"

Indeed, the entire question becomes merely academic for Allred, who while admitting that the fetus is "actual human life," insisted that it is not a person since it is unable "to live and thrive outside of the maternal environment." Nevertheless, Allred admitted that the question of abortion, even if the fetus is not a person, is still difficult: "I say that personhood is not conferred on the fetus, but it still is a very difficult question. It still is potential human life."

Allred admitted, however, that matters become more difficult when one speaks of second trimester abortion. Abortion in the first trimester and in the second trimester, he said, are "philosophically two totally different questions. That early abortion is a lot easier for me, obviously, is what I'm trying to say, than late abortion. And I wish that people didn't have late abortions. I wish that weren't the case."

"Second trimester abortion," said Allred, "is... a much more difficult question than first trimester, both from the standpoint of the difficulty of it, the medical responsibility on the part of the operator for it, and, as far as I'm concerned, from the philosophical. You may say, 'Oh no, there's no difference at all between an embryo, 15 seconds after it's fertilized, and a fetus at 24 weeks' gestation.' I can't go for that. I think there's a vast difference. A vast difference in every way.

"But there is a tremendous psychological burden, a moral burden, everything else, on the physician who is involved in late second trimester abortion. I'm not too sure that the Supreme Court did not err in their opinion when they basically gave a carte blanche for second trimester abortion, up to the state of viability."

When, in the course of the evening, a woman asked Allred if he performed second trimester abortions, he responded, "Yes, I do. I do do them, and do them quite commonly. Uh, it's been, over the last two or three years, one of the real, trying questions in my own personal existence. Because I am considered to be, I suppose, by most people, the leading provider -- our organization -- the leading provider of this type of service, and there are situations... where I would do them without question. Without any question at all. Maternally threatening situations... But that's not the usual situation. I concede that."

When the woman suggested that Allred could refuse to perform second trimester abortions, he stated, "I could refuse it personally, but it--the service, of course, as you know, would still be done. I -- I -- it may come to a point when I philosophically will decide that I, maybe I don't want to do this. It's been one that I have discussed with, with my wife, with people in our organization, with other physicians. A difficult one."

Because of his admitted discomfort with second trimester abortion, and with abortion-as-birth-control, one might think Allred would actively try to persuade women to put their children up for adoption, rather than abort them. "Over the years," said Allred, "since 1969, we referred literally scores of women for adoption." When asked if there was a long waiting list for adoption, he answered, "Oh, enormous."

But did Allred think it incumbent on himself to refer for adoption? "If there are patients who wish to choose adoption as an option, it's our responsibility to direct the patient to the appropriate agencies," he stated. But, he continued, the problem is "we have to tread a very thin line. Some people are very offended if we do anything. I mean they're coming to us for a medical service. They don't want us to venture our opinion. They don't give a hoot about what we think about it one way or the other! They want a professional service to be rendered in an appropriate manner and get away from us as soon as they possibly can! That's the most common single attitude that we encounter. They don't want us to ask, probing into their lives, 'Do you want to do this? Do you want to do that? Do you want to do the other thing?' If they ask us that, then I think it does become our responsibility. If any of my employees -- if a patient asks them, 'Well, what about adoption?' and if they don't go into that with a patient, then we are negligent, and we are remiss."

Edward Allred said he found the entire abortion debate most disturbing because it was dividing the country. He said he thought that this "great American dilemma" would be over, perhaps, when more "private" means -- such as, presumably "morning after pills" -- became more common and replaced surgical abortion. "I do hope," he said, "that when the mechanical act of abortion ends, or basically ends, for most people, for most patients, sometime in the next five to seven years, that a large part of the emotionalism around the issue will diffuse, and there will only be a few people on each side that will be worried about the issue... Unwanted pregnancies will be terminated by means that are very private. People won't be running to abortion clinics, and maybe that will be good. I'm kind of, would like to self-destruct in that way."

TOP