Patricia Neal, Actress

Brad Mattes
www:lifeissues.org

The actress Patricia Neal passed away recently, succumbing to lung cancer. The Academy Award winner knew lots of heartache during her life—namely the grief of abortion. According to her autobiography, she became pregnant during an affair with Gary Cooper. She gave in to his pressure to have an abortion, thinking it would save her career. In her book she wrote, “If I had only one thing to do over in my life I would have that baby.” She confided to a longtime friend, “alone in the night for over forty years I have cried for my child.” But Patricia Neal had several opportunities to counsel pregnant women not to make the same mistake she did and to have the baby. Perhaps now she’s in heaven greeting the baby she never got to hold in her arms.