The satanic attack on God’s design for the family began in the Garden of Eden, and the roots of abortion ideology can be traced there as well.
That was one of the key points Care Net President and CEO Roland Warren shared during a recent appearance on The Pro-Life Team Podcast, hosted by Frank Pavone and Jacob Barr. Pavone is a longtime pro-life advocate who serves as national director of Priests for Life, while Barr is founder and CEO of iRapture, a faith-based marketing agency that works with pregnancy resource centers. The podcast focused on how fatherhood and family shape the pro-life movement.
“Abortion is basically a rejection of a vulnerable life. It’s a rejection of life, but it’s also a declaration that I know what’s better for my life than God does,” Roland noted. “The first place that you see that is in the Garden of Eden where Eve says, ‘My fruit, my choice.’ In other words, ‘My body, my choice.’ She eats that fruit, and Adam is silent. And then, of course, she gives it to him.”
That same dynamic is prevalent in the current pro-choice movement, which seeks to glorify the “my body, my choice” mantra while silencing or minimizing the voice of men.
That original sin replaced the unity and community found in the Garden of Eden with antipathy and autonomy (my body, my choice), Roland said. That sin created antipathy between husband and wife, and also between Adam and Eve and God.
“Today, Satan uses the same playbook that he used in the Garden. When you unpack it, you see the ramifications of how it plays into the abortion issue. The attack in the Garden was not an attack on an individual. It was an attack on the family.”
In commenting on the need for men to play a more active role in pregnancy decisions, Pavone recalled a moment that made an indelible mark on him during sidewalk counseling outside an abortion facility.
A pastor was shouting out, “Adam! Adam!”
He was preaching to the men sitting in their cars, saying, “Adam, you have to go in there. Go in there and care for that woman and care for that baby. Go in there, Adam.”
Pavone said, “It was beautiful. It stuck with me ever since.”
The priest commented that the call for Adam to step up to the plate and fulfill his God-given role was emblematic of Care Net’s mandate.
On the podcast, Roland Warren explained that his work before Care Net as president of the National Fatherhood Initiative shaped his belief that the abortion issue cannot be separated from fatherhood, marriage, and family. That perspective has become central to the organization’s broader ministry.
Care Net’s holistic, Pro Abundant Life approach is rooted in the birth of Jesus, which Roland describes as the most well-known unplanned pregnancy in history. He says the story of Mary and Joseph shows that supporting women facing unplanned pregnancies means caring for the whole family. Care Net’s Fatherhood Initiative is called The Joseph Project.
“It’s all there in the first chapter of the first book (Matthew) of the New Testament. You see God’s design for family clearly laid out—a father and mother, united in marriage, loving each other, loving their child, and loving God,” Roland said.
Today, the organization equips pregnancy centers across its network with fatherhood resources, encourages staff to invite men into appointments and provides practical support designed specifically for fathers. One example is Care Net’s Doctor Dad® course, which prepares pregnancy centers to welcome men with compassion, hope, and help from the start of their fatherhood journey.
On the podcast, Roland said nearly 80% of Care Net’s centers now offer resources for men, a major shift from when he first began working with the organization. He accentuated Pavone’s recollection of the pastor’s exhortation of “Adam!” to the men outside the pregnancy center.
“When God came moving (in the Garden), what did he say?” asked Roland. “He didn’t say, ‘Eve, where are you?’ He said, ‘Adam, where are you?’ Every pregnancy center should be saying, ‘Adam, where are you? Because you have a responsibility. You’re part of this. You have a role to play here in God’s design.”
Click here to watch The Pro-Life Team Podcast featuring Roland Warren.