Conceived in Rape – Now Fighting for the Unborn
Ryan Bomberger co-founded The Radiance Foundation with his wife, Bethany, to be a voice for the weak and downtrodden in society. His story started with a courageous birth mom who experienced the horror and the violence of rape, yet she chose life for her baby. She not only enabled Ryan to live, she gave him the incredible gift of adoption – and he became one of 13 children in the Bomberger family. When people ask what inspired him to be pro-life and to be an adoption advocate, Ryan answers, “Being adopted and loved.”
CVB: Tell me how the idea for The Radiance Foundation came to you.
Ryan: My wife is a teacher and I’m a media professional and we wanted to do more to tackle tough social issues. We wanted to confront the issue of abortion. We wanted to talk about adoption, and fatherlessness, and poverty, and racism in the context of God-given purpose. So we created The Radiance Foundation to illuminate, educate, and motivate; to illuminate the truth that every human life has purpose; to educate people about a myriad of social issues; and then to motivate people to take that knowledge and put it into action.
We felt called by God to creatively illuminate that life has purpose, whether you’re planned, unplanned, able or disabled, red, yellow, black, brown, or white.
The genesis of The Radiance Foundation is from my story of adoption, being conceived in rape. But it’s also my wife Bethany’s story, in that the name comes from our oldest daughter who is named Radiance.
My wife was a single Mom for almost two years and faced the same fear and confusion of single women who find themselves in an unplanned pregnancy. She was in a tough situation with a man who did not care for her and was unkind to her. She left the relationship and discovered she was pregnant. She never wanted Radiance to be ashamed of how she came to be. She wanted her to understand that she is loved by God, and so her name is from Psalm 34:5 – “they looked upon them and their faces were radiant, and they never were never covered with shame.”
But luckily I came into the picture and became her Dad just before she became two. I officially adopted her when she was five. My little girl is no longer a little girl, but she has a beautiful testimony because her mom chose to be stronger than her circumstances.
Read the full interview here.
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