By Gretchen Keiser

A center staffed by volunteers who seek to dissuade women from having abortions was dedicated recently to the memory of a Griffin woman who carried her baby to term despite her own diagnosis of terminal cancer.

The center in Hapeville was named in honor of Laurie Slagle, who died a year ago. Her son Jonathan, who was born in September 1985, is now almost two and a half years old, the youngest of 11 children in the family of Laurie and Tom Slagle, a permanent deacon at Sacred Heart parish in Griffin.

Jean Hess, an employee of Eastern Airlines who has been active in pro-life work, and a corps of volunteer counselors, opened the center on Labor Day 1984 in space donated by a parishioner of St. John the Evangelist parish in Hapeville. Called the Pregnancy problem Center, it is located at 411 King Arnold Street in Hapeville, a few blocks from the Catholic church, but it is a private and not a parish endeavor. The Rintye family donated the space.

Volunteer counselors staff the center different days of the week and make appointments to talk to women concerned about being pregnant and needing help, Mrs. Hess said. The center provides free pregnancy tests and information on the stages of fetal development during pregnancy. Help can range from arranging shelter for women who have nowhere to go, to providing maternity clothes and baby supplies, Mrs. Hess said. The center is run on donations.

The dedication to Mrs. Slagle took place on Sat., Feb. 6 at the center, which was crowded with friends of the Slagle family and supporters of the center. All of the Slagle children attended the dedication, which included a prayer by Father Michael Woods, pastor of St. John’s parish, music and the recitation of the rosary. The Slagle family regularly joined at the Hess home in first Saturday rosary devotions. A plaque with a photo of Laurie Slagle and Jonathan, taken a few months before her death, and a dedication message, was mounted in the living room area of the center.

Mrs. Slagle, 38, was pregnant with Jonathan when she was diagnosed as having a particularly virulent form of cancer that was inoperable. Doctors encouraged her to have an abortion because she needed chemotherapy and radiation treatments and they did not know what effect the treatments would have on her unborn child. She was also told that if she continued her pregnancy, the cancer would spread more quickly and she might not live to deliver the child. When Laurie and Tom Slagle refused to abort the child, Laurie was denied chemotherapy treatments because of the possible damage to the child and future liability. The matter was resolved in a hearing in DeKalb Superior Court, after an attorney appointed to represent the unborn child argued in favor of the chemotherapy treatments.

Jonathan was born without complications and remains a healthy child. Mrs. Slagle lived about a year and a half beyond his birth.

Father Woods, in his prayer, noted that Laurie chose “foolishness in the face of the wisdom of the world,” which saw her best option as abortion, and chose to be “foolish” in guarding her child’s life and valuing his life despite her own sickness and the risk to her own health. That was the foolishness of the cross of Christ, he said. He expressed hope that the women who come to the center for help will find there “a foolishness full of joy, full of hope: for their lives and the lives of their unborn children.”