Claire's Hope Project: Honoring the Life of Claire Hope
Claire Hope was a beautiful child with Trisomy 18. Her parents were "encouraged" to abort her, but instead brought their precious child to term. Claire Hope lived for several weeks, bringing great joy and appreciation to her parents.
To show their thanks for Claire Hope's life, her parents purchased a building which housed an abortion business for many years. They named the project Claire's Hope.
Nearly 250 guests, some from Pensacola, Florida, and as far away as Baton Rouge, Louisiana, came to Mobile, Alabama, to celebrate the newly opened Claire's Hope on 9 May 2008. The crowd anxiously awaited the unveiling of what Claire's Hope will actually do with this former abortion business.
Daniel Johnson thanked the new building owners for allowing the beautiful life of their daughter, Claire, to inspire them to raise awareness and to educate.
Jennifer Lopes, Executive Director of Claire's Hope then approached the podium to share the vision of Claire's parents Billy and Tammy. Lopes plans to work with local community and leaders to create a place that will give the facts about abortion, abortion alternatives, and adoption placement.
One former "procedure room" in the building will be transformed into a "live birth room" replete with a birth table, a warming bed, a fetal heart monitor, and a sonogram machine.
The room will also have a flat screen television with a documentary produced by Adoption Rocks, an adoption awareness group, located in Mobile, Alabama. The film features a birth mom who chose to place her child for adoption and her reasons why.
Another room once used for abortions, still laden with stains on the floor, will be left "as is." This museum-type room will be re-equipped with the tools of the abortion industry. This will include an exam table, a suction machine, and a documentary of a detailed abortion procedure.
Inside the walls of where thirty years worth of reproductive "choice" reigned, there will be a chapel and a wall of forgiveness.
This wall will be a safe place for men and woman to properly and safely memorialize their lost child or children. One memorial already inside read, "Some women hold a son. I now hold my 'choice'. I am sorry."
It is proven that most women feel shame, regret, depression, and guilt for many years after having an abortion, Lopes stated.
The invitation was extended to each person to enter the building for a tour. Once inside each guest was given a flower by Claire's siblings. By the end of the procession the abortion room floors were covered in colorful flowers as a memorial and as a representation of each one's prayers
The young and the old were tear-filled as they visited the "recovery room" of the abortion business that is now being turned into a memorial. They read the accounts and letters from moms who aborted their babies and are now sorry. The moms attached their letters to baby shoes that are now on display in the room where they were once left alone, scared, sorry, bleeding, vomiting, or being rushed out the doors.
The smell of fresh flowers somehow brought a hint of refreshing "HOPE" of what is to come to this building. An ornately framed portrait of Claire Hope Cox will be among the first articles commissioned to the building. It is, indeed, her memory to be honored through this project.
It is Claire's Hope and the founders dream that those seeking healing and forgiveness will come.
Plans are now under way to renovate and restore an area that is called "Hope's Corner."
Tours, educational fairs, and more will be available to the public in the near future.
As Heather Colsen, a post abortive woman, so bravely stated at the dedication service, "Let us not grow lax in our attempts to seek more opportunities to uphold the sanctity of human life. But, let us rejoice – today, in this victory, and this land being redeemed for good and for hope."
[http://claireshope.com/, 2008]