When I was going to school to become a cosmetologist we were told to never discuss the big three, the trifecta of client downfall: religion, politics, and sex. I’ve never really been down with keeping quiet about tough subjects and eventually ended up working in a salon where all three were discussed openly and sometimes at length, it was awesome and kept things interesting. Much more interesting than double knee surgeries, BM schedules, and hip replacements the Florida retiree set likes to chat nonstop about.
While I certainly don’t agree with some people’s version of the truth and they have the right to not agree with mine, I am always fascinated to follow someone else’s train of thought that led them in forming their opinions and conclusions. If I were the kind of person to put a bumper sticker on my car it would read, “Screw Taboo, Let’s Talk.”
Writing a personal blog is fun because it not only chronicles the events of my life during this surrogacy, I also get to share my opinions, beliefs, and my train of thought. I get to choose my exact words, words like “crotch” that embarrass my mother and entertain others, as well as paint the picture of what I see and want you to know. The reader audience then gets to decide if they want to read what I have to say. Pretty cool system, eh?
So today I’m going to narrate the thought process I went through when I addressed gestational surrogacy in terms of God, my faith, and my church community. In effort to keep a highly complex yet simple subject area condensed and to the best of my own ability coherent, I’m going to keep it short (ha ha)and directly related to gestational surrogacy while hopefully still contributing the right amount of detail to provide satisfaction.
God:
I believe God is the uncreated creator of the universe. I believe that God knows everything and anything at all times. I believe that God gives, sustains, and takes away life. I believe He is just in those decisions even though it is incredibly hard on us. I take seriously the responsibility to make decisions that are pleasing to God and that bring Him glory. I also know that I sin constantly and fall short. I believe and know that despite falling short that I still belong to God through what Christ did on the cross. I love God and I fear God. I ask God (God, Jesus, and the gift of the Holy Spirit) to be with me and guide me in my daily life and the decisions I am responsible to make. I ask for forgivness and receive it when I repent. I ask for discernment in the desires of my heart and for him to show me (through the words in the bible, the Godly people who surround me, strangers, events, circumstances, and my own personal relationship with Him) what He wants me to do.
Faith:
Just because we have certain technology doesn’t mean we should always use it and just because we can’t physically do something ourselves doesn’t mean we shouldn’t seek alternatives or ask others for help. There are a lot of areas in the world of infertility that I don’t find biblical and wouldn’t partake in but there are areas/procedures that I do think are within Godly limits. The bible tells us that even before we were born He knew that we were meant to be. I believe that even babies that are conceived and achieved through teen parents, drug addicts, rape victims, adoption, fertility treatments, in vitro, surrogates, and (in another one of my own experiences- hence the falling short I mentioned above) premarital sex with The Husband are still lives that God knew about, sustained, were meant to be, and have Godly purpose. It may not always be for any reason we understand, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD (Isaiah 55:8). These babies sometimes arrive surrounded by controversy and many times with consequence to those involved, good or bad sometimes (usually a combination of both) but nonetheless I believe they arrive by a force and a reason greater than us. I can’t say I know for sure exactly what God thinks about my specific situation with Lucy and Ricky or gestational surrogacy in general anymore than you, my pastor, your pastor, or the Pope thinks they can. It isn’t an area that was mapped out by Him in exact detail for us to know. I trust and have faith that my decision to be a gestational surrogate along with the decisions that govern my surrogacy agreement are biblically sound.
My Church Community:
Our church community is rather large and I’d say only a small minority even know who I am and what I am doing. I know that as Bebe grows The Husband and I are going to be doing a lot more explaining on what exactly is going on.
So far, I have been very blessed. Anyone who has spoken to me directly has seemed to be sincere and respectful about what I am doing, although I don’t really know what is going on behind my back, lol. At any rate, the feeling I get from most women in my church community is a mutual understanding of what it feels like to be a mom, what it felt like wanting to be a mom, and sometimes what form it takes to become a mom. They have all seemed understanding of the desire of a parent to want that genetic link to their child even if that means that someone else has to do the carrying for them. I am honored and thrilled to be in the presence of their friendship and the support for what I am doing is beyond words. Having said that, it doesn’t mean ALL of them have come to the same conclusions I have. Despite that, they still pray for me, laugh with me, cry with me, and love me.
Now, most people in our church community have wondered or asked what does the church think?
In the beginning I spoke to the current and past women’s ministry leaders about my desires and plans on becoming a surrogate. Later I spoke to our head pastor in which I have always felt I’ve had a special relationship with. His fatherly advice was that he didn’t desire for me to be a surrogate and it was hard to hear that as his personal opinion means a lot to me, but I also felt like I was being clearly called to be a surrogate. Sidebar: I want to clarify that while I always felt spiritually driven to this decision, I did question myself (constantly) because I didn’t want to be deceived by my own heart or disobey the Lord. Our church community is amazing and it means a lot to me and The Husband. In talking with our head pastor I needed to know from a pastoral perspective if what I wanted to do and the specifics concerning the surrogacy was cause for church reprimand or violated moral code. I wanted to know how the church would respond if someone marched up to the church office demanding to know if they knew what I was doing and what they thought of it. I was told that my surrogacy situation was not immoral, that I (and my family) wouldn’t be cast from the church family, and in not these exact words that if anyone marched up to the office they would be told it wasn’t any of their concern. Obviously, I was happy to have received that response. Of all the risks I’ve assumed in this entire journey the consistency of the church position is actually the one that scares me the most and the one that continually sends me to my knees.
I want and desire to live a life that is rooted in the Lord because that is the life that will bring me satisfaction and provide the grace I need. I thought our pastor summed it up well when speaking to the teens about when they make plans for their lives if their plans don’t include God, Jesus, or the church they might as well run head on into a concrete wall and hope they don’t hurt themselves too much in the process. I spent too many years of my life running head on into that concrete wall, hurting myself and then trying to figure out how to repair the damage. Navigating God’s plans for my life usually are never clear cut, never make perfect sense and sometimes they are downright hard but I know that living for Him and the growth I see from the constant conversion of my heart in the process leaves me feeling more fulfilled and gives me more freedom than I could have ever imagined and that is why, in all the areas mentioned above, I really needed to take the notion of doing a surrogacy so seriously.
© Pocketbebe, 2010
