Transparent heart icon with white outline and + sign.

Life's busy, read it when you're ready!

Create a free account to save articles for later, keep track of past articles you’ve read, and receive exclusive access to all RP resources.

White magnifying glass.

Search thousands of RP articles

Articles, news, and reviews that celebrate God's truth.

Open envelope icon with @ symbol

Get Articles Delivered!

Articles, news, and reviews that celebrate God's truth. delivered direct to your Inbox!

A A
By:

Anonymous Father’s Day

Documentary
2011 / 44 min
Rating: 7/10

It begins with a moving testimony from a woman describing how she felt when she discovered that she was conceived through a sperm donor, and that she had no idea who her actual father really was. She quickly discovered “donor-conceived persons” number in the hundreds of thousands, and thirty to sixty thousand new human beings are conceived using donor sperm every year. This is now $3.3 billion industry, with very few regulations.

However, in their desperate quest for children, many adults have forgotten the impact their decisions will have on children who now realize that one-half of their family tree is a question mark. “My daddy’s name is donor,” reads one slogan. “I am the child of a stranger,” reads another. “Nobody stops to think,” muses the documentarian Barry Stevens, himself conceived using a sperm donor, “that the babies grow up.” Is it so hard to understand, Stevens asks, that donor-conceived persons just want to know the basic facts surrounding their origin? Interviewee after interviewee describes an inexplicable sense of loss, and recount whole childhoods spent creating memories and imaginary fathers. “I look in the mirror,” one said, “and I don’t know who I look like.”

Surprisingly, there has been quite a backlash against donor-conceived persons who choose to tell their stories. From infertile couples to radical gay rights activists who see these reproductive technologies as a path to parenthood, those advocating the regulation of what they call “an industry to design, produce, and sell babies” are often told to keep their mouths shut. This is in spite of the fact that the murky origins of donor-conceived persons are leading to problems that border on the bizarre – including what one called “accidental incest,” in which there is increasingly a real possibility (and real examples) of biological half-brothers and half-sisters getting married.

This is not just about the ethics surrounding reproductive technologies and scientists manipulating the beginning of new human lives. It is also about young men and women staring in the mirror and wondering whose eyes and hair and smile they have, and whether or not the strangers they pass on their way to work are actually their half-siblings, cousins, relatives. Anonymous Father’s Day is about family and its centrality and importance. It may be beginning a conversation nobody wants to have, but it is certainly a conversation that needs to happen.

You can watch it for free on YouTube here, and check out the trailer below.

Enjoyed this article?

Get the best of RP delivered to your inbox every Saturday for free.



Red heart icon with + sign.
Documentary, Movie Reviews, Pro-life - Abortion, Watch for free

Babies are murdered here

Documentary 2014 / 54 minutes Rating: 8/10 This must-see is first and foremost an encouragement for anyone sitting on the sidelines to get active and start saving the unborn. Where the film gets controversial is in the producers' argument that we must name the sin that is going on behind clinic doors. They want Christians to start using stark, clear terms, like "murder" and "murderer" to clearly and accurately identify these shameful deeds. As one commentator in the film explains early on: We want to go into these neighborhoods – if we go into these neighborhoods – and whisper and invite and plead. And what we need to be doing is shaming this behavior. We need to be showing people what's going on... Friends I've spoken to who are actively involved in pro-life activism have questioned whether using the word "murderer" will shame women, or simply make pro-lifers look hateful, condemning and graceless. That's a good question, and good reason to watch this film. The men and women we see witnessing are carrying large signs that read "Babies are Murdered Here" but there isn't a hint of self-righteousness about them. They are clear, and generally pretty winsome too; truth is being coupled with grace. I find their approach comparable to pro-lifers who make use of large graphic pictures and pair that with soft-spoken words. There are many other ways we can present the Truth, so we don't have to use the words "murder" or "murderer." But the film makes a convincing case that we must not shy away from these words, or deny their accuracy. According to the conventional pro-life presentation, abortionists are murderers, and the mothers are victims. That's a lie we have to stop repeating. It's a lie that obscures the crime these women are setting out to do. As RC Sproul Jr. explains: It is, perhaps, the most heinous crime I can imagine. It is the most "against nature thing" I can imagine, for a woman who has been gifted by God and called by God to nurture and protect her children to instead turn around and murder that child. It is not just an ordinary murder. When we commit an ordinary murder the other person can fight back. When we commit an ordinary murder it's not the very fruit of our own bodies. It is a wicked, wicked, vile thing and we need to say so... without diminishing the depth and the scope and the power of the grace of God in Jesus Christ. We need to be clear about the crime we hope to prevent. We want to save these mothers from becoming murderers. We want to save those who have already become murderers. This is why they need the Gospel. And this is why we need to be there sharing it with them. You can watch Babies are Murdered Here for free below or at BabiesAreMurderedHere.com. Since this film was released in 2014, one of the commentators interviewed, RC Sproul Jr., had to resign from his position at Ligonier Ministries, related to two public sins. However, the points he makes in the film stand on their own....