"She felt she wasn't getting enough attention," says Weddington. "It's sad to do this now when so many people are working against pro-choice But all Jane Roe did was to sign an affidavit She was pregnant and didn't want to be That was her only involvement in the case. I was shoplifting when I met Connie, she worked in the store She let me keep the goods. All of that is sinning but the far greater sin I did was to be the plaintiff in Roe vs Wade."Sarah Weddington says she was disappointed, but not surprised, when she heard of McCorvey's conversion. "I'm reading the Bible every day, trying to understand the scriptures I was a sinner I sold drugs, I've been a thief.
She's like a new infant, a new baby can't be expected to understand You can't equivocate The Bible says: `Not my will but thine be done'. That means it's not my body so it's not my choice.""I'll take this at my own pace," says McCorvey. Even though she's just heard a sermon from Benham condemning all abortion, she stands by this view. "For some women it's appropriate, if they find out early in their pregnancy that the child may be born deformed ..." She pauses and cuts her voice to a whisper. "It was the women who would call the clinic and want abortions after three months, that's what was driving me so low.
I couldn't sleep at night."Benham would prefer that McCorvey not cut corners with her morality and clearly expects a clean sweep "She doesn't have all her theological Ts crossed yet. I think I could walk away from Jesus before I'd walk out on Connie."There is another area of potential friction. McCorvey told ABC News that she believes women should be allowed an abortion in the first trimester. "She has been with me through it all - she was the first to know that I was the real Jane Roe. She doesn't have to desert Connie, just so long as everything is pure.""Connie will not be deserted," says McCorvey. "I've told her that the Lord is full of tolerance and love but that don't mean homosexuality is OK. Miss Norma knows her relationship with Connie must now be pure.
He says he was an alcoholic when he became a born-again Christian. He and McCorvey say they've had many experiences in common, but Benham has never been a homosexual. Norma McCorvey is, and for 26 years she has lived with the same woman, Connie Gonzales."I've talked to Norma about Connie," says Benham. Flip Benham has much more in common with McCorvey than Sarah Weddington ever did Benham used to run a spit and sawdust saloon in Florida. "Flipper and his people have a humility, they don't care where I came from."They do care where she's going and that's where Norma McCorvey may face new tensions. He told me about the time he had shouted at me and I recalled it real well.""I wanted to say sorry and I did," says Benham. "I said `Miss Norma, I knew those words penetrated you and hurt your heart Please forgive me' She looked at me real serious and then she laughed.
She told me she'd have to think it over." McCorvey says she was struck by Benham's apology because in years of what she says was mistreatment by the pro-choice movement nobody ever said they were sorry. "We were talking and Flip suddenly told me he had an apology to make. "After a while I really felt Flip cared for me, in a way the pro-choice people never had." Benham and McCorvey began to take lunch together and members of his church began to call, inviting Norma to services McCorvey remembers a flight to New York with Benham. They were scheduled to appear on a TV show, to debate the different sides of what has often been America's fiercest political battle. Unlike her old friends at the pro-choice clinic, Benham has been devoted in his attentions. In her autobiography McCorvey claims she lied to get Weddington's sympathy; she felt the lawyer was about to turn her case down It took her 18 years to confess her lie publicly "I knew I had done wrong, when I lied," says McCorvey.
