Here’s a positive story for a change. Around the time of the anniversary of the overturning of Roe v. Wade, an abandoned baby has been formally adopted by the individual who found her.
If this isn’t a pro-life solution, I don’t know what is. In this case, a firefighter and his wife are now the parents of baby Zoey, who was surrendered to the authorities earlier this year:
Six months ago, a newborn baby girl made history by being the first to be surrendered to Florida’s first Safe Haven Baby Box – now baby Zoey has been adopted by her rescuer.
Orlando’s CBS affiliate WKMG-TV reported that Zoey is happy and healthy with her new adoptive family. Zoey’s rescuer and his wife had been trying to start a family for a decade before she appeared.
Zoey was surrendered to Ocala Fire Rescue on Jan. 5. When a firefighter opened the Safe Haven box, he saw a little girl inside with a shoelace tying off her umbilical cord.
WKMG reported after rushing the baby to the hospital, the firefighter immediately called his wife to start the adoption process.
“Everyone was just in disbelief honestly that she was hand-delivered to us almost and that everything had kind of worked itself out to where we could bring her home two days later,” said Zoey’s new mother.
According to the Safe Haven Baby Boxes organization’s website, their objective is to “prevent illegal abandonment of newborns by raising awareness” by “offering a 24-hour hotline for mothers in crisis and offering the Safe Haven Baby Boxes as a last resort option for women who want to maintain complete anonymity.”
Mothers who do not wish to raise their children can safely and legally surrender their children to firefighters, hospitals, or others in a Baby Box. The organization also provides a hotline women can call to receive free counseling. “To date, the hotline has received over 8,000 calls from every state in the United States. Safe Haven Baby Boxes has referred over 500 women to crisis pregnancy centers, assisted in 9 adoption referrals, and have had over 132 legal Safe Haven surrenders,” the website noted.
This is not only a heartwarming story, but it’s also an example of how regular folks can help decrease abortions by providing services like Baby Boxes. It’s a community solution that is not centered on the government. I wrote earlier about how the pro-life movement needs to focus more heavily on changing hearts and minds and impacting the culture now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned. This is one avenue through which mothers in crisis can be presented with an alternative to terminating their pregnancies.
Pro-lifers should emphasize these types of services while also coming up with novel ways to provide alternatives to abortion. Legislation is a step in the right direction, but saving the lives of unborn children will require winning over the culture as well.