Flowers honoring the memory of all the children killed at the now-closed ACU abortion facility in Hinsdale, Illinois [Photo by John Jansen]
Last year the Pro-Life Action League reported that notorious Chicago area abortionists Vinod and Vijay Goyal had sent a cold-call mailing [PDF] to local physicians inviting them to consider working at one of the six abortion clinics the husband-and-wife team owned at the time.
The letter also tried to drum up business for the financially troubled Goyals. Their business has been down in recent years — which means their abortions have been down, reflecting a statewide trend across Illinois. Five years ago, the Goyals owned seven abortion clinics, but that number is currently down to four, as we’ve now learned that yet another one of their facilities — the ACU Health Center in west suburban Hinsdale — is also permanently closed!
Grassroots Pro-Life Activism Closed This Abortion Clinic
The closing of the ACU abortion clinic is a textbook example that proves grassroots pro-life activism works.
Shortly after ACU started doing abortions in 1997, as many as 20 women and girls would be standing in line outside ACU waiting for it to open on a Saturday morning. Not to be deterred, a small group of pro-lifers began consistently coming out to pray and offer help to women through sidewalk counseling. One of these pro-life activists, Amy Keane, recently wrote an article that appeared in the bulletin of St. Isaac Jogues Parish, also located in Hinsdale, in which she said:
Twenty women going in to the clinic with only five people praying week after week, year after year seemed like impossible odds. We were constantly reminded of Mother Teresa’s words. “We are called upon not to be successful, but to be faithful.”
In the midst of the suffering, there were also moments of joy when many couples changed their minds. When they accepted help and trusted things would work out. Our local pregnancy centers were Jesus’ face to so many in need. Those praying at the clinic were selfless in the love they showed people they had just met, including a woman who brought a 15-year old girl seeking an abortion, abused and abandoned by her parents, into her home. This mother of five welcomed a frightened young girl with no thought of the cost to her family. God brought good from evil time and time again.
The turning point at the clinic was the day the [Eucharistic] Adoration Chapel opened at St Isaac Jogues — Ash Wednesday, 2008. The next weekend the number of people praying doubled, then tripled. Soon there were 25-30 people every Saturday morning at 5:30 a.m. saying the rosary. Father Pat Murphy joined the group regularly and really increased awareness of the local abortion clinic at St. Isaac Jogues. Slowly the number of women coming decreased to only 4-5 on a Saturday. Almost two years ago, the clinic stopped doing abortions except for Tuesday mornings. …
The answers to prayer during the last twenty years at the Hinsdale abortion clinic are a message of hope, perseverance, faithfulness and LOVE. Anything is possible with God.
Every time an abortion clinic closes, it’s cause for rejoicing. Praise God and to Him alone be the glory!
And special thanks to Amy Keane, who, along with fellow sidewalk counselor Lynn Benz and a host of others, showed us what can happen when a group of rank-and-file churchgoers prayerfully take up the mantle of pro-life activism in response to an abortion clinic in their community.
