Former atheist abortion provider details his journey to becoming a pro-life Christian
A former atheist who performed hundreds of abortions recently shared how he became a pro-life Christian after feeling convicted by a sermon.
Dr. Vansen Wong of Sacramento, California, recently sat down with Christian podcaster Billy Hallowell for an interview posted to YouTube last week by CBN News.
Wong said he first got into doing abortions for financial reasons, the procedure being one of many operations he performed as part of an effort to work extra hours.
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"What I would say is that I viewed [abortion] as providing a service," he said. "[I said to myself], abortion is legal in this country. By law, our healthcare company has to provide abortion services, and it's got to be someone in our specialty, and if I don't help out in this cause, then it's just going to fall on a couple of people."
Wong described learning how to perform dilation and curettage (D&C), a procedure in which the cervix is dilated so that the uterine lining can be scraped with a curette to remove tissue. D&C is commonly used as an abortion procedure.
"It's obvious what we're doing in a sense that before doing an abortion, you've got to do an ultrasound to accurately access how far along this woman's pregnancy is. How big is her baby? Because if you're wrong and either she's not pregnant in the uterus or if she's too far along, bad things can happen," Wong explained.
"So, it could lead to grave complications if you miss an ectopic pregnancy. You could go down a path where you're going to have unexpected bleeding and also run into a situation where your suction tubing isn't able to complete the abortion. Then, you would have to grab instruments that only a skilled abortionist would be able to use."
Wong recalled thinking he was "compassionate" for doing what he did, being one of the few doctors in his department willing and able to perform the procedure.
Wong said he previously had two relationships with women who had abortions, saying he could relate to "the mindset, the fear, the rationale, the justification" of why women turn to abortion.
"I thought it would be very hypocritical of me to say to somebody, 'oh, that's wrong, you shouldn't have an abortion,' or 'I won't perform it,'" Wong recalled.
Wong said that it took a couple of years for him to become a Christian, even as he and his family regularly attended church.
"When I became a Christian, it was not an instantaneous, connect-the-dots that 'Oh my gosh, people are infinitely valuable, made in God's image. He's known us before He formed us. He knitted us in our mother's womb. He has incredible plans for us.' I really didn't understand initially that performing abortions was wrong," Wong said.
He recalled a tragic event at work where he was tasked with caring for an 18-year-old woman who had given birth the day before and had an emergency hysterectomy.
"It was my responsibility to take care of her during the night as she recovered in the intensive care unit. And for reasons I still don't understand, she died," Wong said.
"And that was a tragedy that is beyond words. I remember every moment of that six-hour period like it was yesterday."
The devastation, Wong said, shattered his pride.
"I had to face the reality that when it came time to really make a difference, I failed abysmally. So, I was in the depths of my career right away," he said.
Another issue arose, later on, Wong said, when the state reviewed his medical license.
"That possibility led me to try to make a bargain with God. You see, because we had started our family, got a new home in a nice neighborhood, and if I'm not a doctor, I'm not making any money. What's going to happen to us financially and socially? And how do I tell my friends and relatives what has happened?" Wong shared.
Being in a new neighborhood, Wong said his family was "surrounded by people of faith" who attended a church that was starting out in the local high school. Wong took his children to the church, describing himself as a seeker at that time.
During the "time of crisis," Wong said he "made a deal with God."
"I prayed that 'God, if you can get me through this mess, I'll be yours.' And so that's how I became a Christian," Wong said.
As Wong continued to attend church, his pastor eventually preached on abortion during the early 2000s, when a federal ban on partial-birth abortions was being debated.
"It was an uncharacteristic description of that barbaric procedure that made me realize, 'my God, you are telling me that abortion is wrong,'" he said. "And within a short period of time, as I was walking back to the parking lot, I realized that what I was doing with my small plastic tube was no less barbaric than what people who were doing these partial-birth abortions were doing."
"The body parts were smaller for me, but the act and the effect on that little baby was just as barbaric," he continued. "And so, it was at that point that I realized that abortion was no longer something I should be participating in."
Nicole Alcindor is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: nicole.alcindor@christianpost.com.
