This Week in Christian History: 'Roe' Gets Baptized; Shakers Come to America; Martin Luther Foe Dies

By Michael Gryboski, Mainline Church Editor Sunday, August 05, 2018

'Roe' of Roe v. Wade Baptized - August 8, 1995

Norma McCorvey arrives at the U.S. Supreme Court April 26, 1989, before the justices heard a key abortion case from Missouri seeking to limit the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. McCorvey was the Jane Roe in the case. (AP Photo)

This week marks the anniversary of when Norma McCorvey, the plaintiff in the landmark 1973 United States Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, was baptized.

The ceremony took place in a swimming pool at a house in the Dallas, Texas suburb of Garland, with 35 people in attendance. The Rev. Philip Benham, a fundamentalist minister and national director of the pro-life group Operation Rescue, performed the baptism.

McCorvey's religious experience included a change of heart on the abortion issue, with the former Jane Roe quitting her job as marketing director for the pro-choice clinic A Choice for Women.

"I'm pro-life. I think I have always been pro-life, I just didn't know it," said McCrovey in an interview with a radio station at the time, as quoted in a 1995 New York Times article.