Prayerfully

Prayerfully Pro-Choice:
Resources for Worship
Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 1

THE RELIGIOUS COALITION FOR REPRODUCTIVE CHOICE
The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, founded in 1973, is a non-partisan,
non-profit education and advocacy organization comprising more than 40 national groups
representing major denominations, movements, and faith groups.
As the only national interfaith organization dedicated to preserving reproductive choice,

the Religious Coalition has the unique mission of ensuring reproductive choice through
the moral power of religious communities. Our nationwide network encompasses clergy
of all faiths, activists in state affiliates throughout the country, and individuals committed
to reproductive and religious freedom.
All Religious Coalition programs seek to give clear voice to the reproductive issues of
people of color, those living in poverty, and other underserved populations.

Dear Friends:
Clergy and laity who would like to organize and present worship services and faith-
oriented events dealing with reproductive choice have long wanted a resource for
sermons, prayers, rituals and other materials.
In Prayerfully Pro-Choice: Resources for Worship, the Religious Coalition for

Reproductive Choice offers a compilation of resources that affirm reproductive choice.
This project began several years ago with a call to members of the Clergy for Choice
Network and Religious Coalition state affiliates for contributions that could be shared
with others. We received many more than we expected and, unfortunately, more than we
could include at this time. To all who contributed, we are grateful for your generosity.
This resource provides representative pieces to stimulate ideas and serve as a foundation
for creating your own sermons and services. The contents include prayers, speeches,
sermons, interfaith services, healing rituals, presentations for special events, individual
statements and biblical passages. We have credited all known authors. We would
appreciate being notified of any changes that are necessary so we may adjust credits in
future editions.
On the recommendation of clergy and others, we have published Prayerfully Pro-Choice

in loose-leaf notebook format so materials can be easily added and rearranged. We also
will make this resource available in electronic form, on a floppy disk as well as the
Religious Coalition website—www.rcrc.org.
We will continue collecting materials such as these and making them available to
affiliates, clergy, and others. We are looking for a broad range of topics related to
reproductive choice—for example, violence, health care, and family issues. We welcome
contributions of materials that you think your colleagues will be interested in.
We hope that this collection of resources will assist you in preparing sermons, delivering
speeches, writing articles and creating worship services that bring a heightened
understanding of what it means to be prayerfully pro-choice. We hope that these
spiritually powerful writings will inspire you in the important work you do.
Faithfully yours,
Reverend Carlton W. Veazey

President and CEO
March 2004

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Prayers ........................................................................................................................................................... 1
A Woman’s Prayer..................................................................................................................................... 2
Nebraska Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
We Come to You in Gratitude, Humility, Pain and Supplication............................................................... 3
Heather Jo McVoy, Ph.D.
Prayer for Times of Decision..................................................................................................................... 4
New York Metro Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
A Community Prayer for Choice ............................................................................................................... 5
Rosemary Radford Ruether
Speeches......................................................................................................................................................... 6
The Unfinished Revolution of Pro-Choice................................................................................................. 7

Reverend Howard Moody
Seeing the World Through Women’s Eyes............................................................................................... 15
Reverend Bernice Powell Jackson
Experiences in Faith ................................................................................................................................ 20
Reverend Ann Hayman
Sermons ....................................................................................................................................................... 26
Faithful Witness for Choice ..................................................................................................................... 27

The Reverend Katherine Hancock Ragsdale
Pro-Prayer, Pro-Family, Pro-Choice...................................................................................................... 27
Reverend Julia Mayo Quinlan
Explaining Abortion to Children ............................................................................................................. 37
Reverend Colleen M. McDonald
Words of Hope ......................................................................................................................................... 39
Dr. James Armstrong
Choice: A Declaration of Faith ............................................................................................................... 42
Bishop Melvin G. Talbert
The “Truth” About Abortion ................................................................................................................... 47
Rabbi Mark Dov Shapiro
Hospital Mergers Restrict Services (Jewish Tradition) ........................................................................... 52
Rabbi Bonnie Margulis
Creating a “Zone of Respect” in Hospital Mergers (Christian Tradition) ............................................. 56
Reverend Kenneth Applegate
Interfaith Services........................................................................................................................................ 60
Faithful Witness for Choice!.................................................................................................................... 61

Sample Liturgical Materials for Interfaith Worship Services.................................................................. 65
A Service of Memory and Dedication ...................................................................................................... 73

Services of Healing ..................................................................................................................................... 80
You Are Not Alone: Seeking Wisdom to Decide ...................................................................................... 81

Diann L. Neu
Affirming a Choice................................................................................................................................... 82
Diann L. Neu
Ceremony for Closure after an Abortion ................................................................................................. 86
Reverend Dr. Kendyl Gibbons
Funeral Service for Miscarriage ............................................................................................................. 90
Rabbi Dana Magat
Special Events .............................................................................................................................................. 93
Family Life Education: Remarks to the State Legislature ....................................................................... 94

Reverend Julie Denny-Hughes
Breaking the Silence about Sexuality in The Black Church..................................................................... 96
Six Billion People—A Matter of Consequence ........................................................................................ 98
Marjorie Signer and Cynthia Cooper
Dedication of Planned Parenthood Headquarters ................................................................................ 101
Reverend Cynthia S. Bumb and the Missouri Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
Blessing for Providers of Women’s Health Care................................................................................... 102
Reverend David Selzer
Theology, Human Sexuality and Reproductive Choice: Individual Statements ............................... 103
Unitarian Universalism ......................................................................................................................... 104

Reverend Dr. Rebecca Edmiston-Lange
The Lutheran Church............................................................................................................................. 105
Reverend Dr. Charles V. Bergstrom
The Episcopal Church ........................................................................................................................... 107
Conservative Judaism............................................................................................................................ 109
Rabbi Neil Sandler
The Presbyterian Church....................................................................................................................... 111
Reform Judaism ..................................................................................................................................... 113
Rabbi Rosalind A. Gold
Catholics for a Free Choice................................................................................................................... 114
Frances Kissling
Society for Humanistic Judaism ............................................................................................................ 116
Rabbi Sherwin T. Wine

Prayers

A Woman’s Prayer
Nebraska Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
Creator God,
You are the source of our life.
You are the energy inside our spirit.
We grow and stretch and strive and hope.
You reach for us and hold out your hand.
You wait for us!
We are made in your image.

You promised that we will grow up to be in you.
Seeds of divinity are planted in us.
You are the destination of our dream.
You wait for us!
In time your care will bring us to perfection.

We are on a voyage.
Our life opens before us like an uncharted sea.
We have no compass but the stars.
You wait for us!
Our life brings hard choices; we long for the light.

Often we have a choice between two goods,
Or we have a choice between the lesser of two evils.
Sometimes it is a good choice not to choose at all.
You wait for us!
Always we are guided by your sovereign power.

Always we are comforted by your close compassion.
Always we are embraced by your tender mercy.
Always we are accepted by your unconditional love.
You wait for us!
Our hearts ache for justice; our eyes have been opened.
We see the faces of suffering and despair.
Our voices cry out for the whole human family.
Our blinding tears wash away our hurt and frustration.
You wait for us!
We renew our strength.

We are one with you.
The world is not yet finished.
We are co-creators with you.

We Come to You in Gratitude, Humility, Pain and Supplication
Heather Jo McVoy, Ph.D.
Heather Jo McVoy is a writer and consultant in Tallahassee, Florida.
Yahweh God, ground of all being, we come to you in gratitude, humility, pain and
supplication. We are grateful for your bounty, past and present, and for your sustaining
care at all times. We are humbled before your justice and steadfast love in the face of our
failures of love, our self-centered view of priorities, and our uncertainties about what
constitutes justice in your sight. We are in pain because people of faith are deeply split
over the issues presented by the problem of abortion and have resorted to invective,
hatred and physical and verbal violence in your name.
We ask that you fill us with your love. Make us instruments of your peace. Teach us to do
your will, not our own. Help us to walk the way of reconciliation and love, and sustain us
in the struggle to stand for what is right, without hatred for those who, in good faith,
believe other than we do. Strengthen us to run the race to the end, not for our own
gratification but that your will be done and your justice reign in the world today. Keep us
mindful that, while we are called to be faithful witnesses, the outcome is in your hands.
We ask that your wisdom, love and justice fill the legislators, the governor, all women
who have struggled with this choice in their own lives or will in the future, and all those
gathered over this issue in this city, around the state and around the nation. Teach us all
to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with you all our days.
Amen.

Prayer for Times of Decision
“Affirming Women’s Moral Agency”
On the Anniversary of Roe v. Wade
New York Metro Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice ©
Blessed are you, creator of the universe, who sustains us in times of decision. You have
made it possible for us to consider with wisdom our lives and the lives of our loved ones,
and you have granted us courage and intelligence to make decisions about our
childbearing.
As you have been with us in times of decision, so may you continue to be with us as we
experience the complexity of life’s demands and responsibilities. Help us to remember
that because we are created in your image, we are required to attend with care to our
health and well-being. Help us to accept that as some of life’s possibilities are lost, some
expectations disappointed, we thereby go on to nurture other commitments, to realize
other fulfillments.
May the support and strength of those close to us continue to sustain us, even as we are
sustained by your gifts of wisdom and strength. Blessed are you, who is with us in times
of decision.

A Community Prayer for Choice
Rosemary Radford Ruether
Rosemary Radford Ruether is Professor of Applied Theology at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

in Evanston, Illinois.
God of our mothers and fathers, source of all life and new life, we are saddened by the
conflicts we often experience; conflicts between life and life, between the affirmation of
potential new life and the ongoing life that we have committed to nurture and strengthen,
our own life and the lives of those we uphold and sustain.
We are more than sad, we are also angry that we are faced with such choices, for these
are choices in which there is no wholly good way; these are choices against a potential
life or against existing life.
We do not like to have to make these choices. We would like to neatly arrange our lives
so we do not have to make these choices, but that is not always possible.
We are surrounded by many children who came into the world without the most minimal
opportunities for love and development. We do not want to create life in that way. We
want to create life that is chosen, life that is cherished and can be sustained and
nourished.
We want to be able to choose the best choices under the circumstances, the choices that
are neither easy nor simple, without pain or hurt.
We stand together as a community today to bear witness to the ability and right of women
and their families to make the best choice, based on their religious convictions, with faith
and with trust.
This prayer has been adapted by the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice.

Speeches

The Unfinished Revolution of Pro-Choice:
Beyond Sound Bites and Slogans
Reverend Howard Moody
Reverend Moody is ordained in the American Baptist Church and the United Church of Christ. He was
Senior Minister of Judson Memorial Church in New York City from 1956-1992, where he is now Minister
Emeritus. While at the Judson Church in 1967, Reverend Moody organized the Clergy Consultation Service
on Abortion, a network of ministers and rabbis willing to help women find safe abortions at a time when
abortion was still illegal. The following speech was delivered at the annual meeting of the Religious
Coalition for Reproductive Choice on September 17, 1997.
My words tonight are addressed to the religious communities that many of you represent,
and I dare say in many instances you may be one of a few who dare to make his or her
voice heard. Since Roe v. Wade, for a number of reasons, many of our religious
institutions have been back-pedaling on resolutions, buying “ecumenical peace” at the
price of abdicating our advocacy and failing to challenge the obstacles that threatened to
turn the freedom of Roe v. Wade into a sham. The churches and synagogues in this nation
were cowed by the religious right. They condemned abortion with such “theological
certainty,” judged its practitioners with such moral conviction that we became speechless
and the issue of women’s reproductive freedom took a back seat on the social agenda of
most every major Protestant denomination.
The first battleground that developed after Roe v. Wade was one of religious warfare. The
anti-choice people were determined to make this battle a challenge to the moral
conscience of this nation. I want to spend a few minutes on the ethical and theological
aspects of their struggle, trying to look at their place in the present struggle.
In recent times, only the Vietnam War has succeeded in creating such a climate of deep
divisions and intolerance as the abortion issue. There is a certain parallel in the ethical
dilemma of both issues. Is it ever regretful to go to war against your enemy? Some people
say “yes,” under certain conditions. Some people say “no,” never.
The similarity in the ethical dilemma of fighting a war and terminating a pregnancy (I
know you don’t like the analogy, but it makes an important point) is the use of force.
Some people draw the line at force against a civilian population, others draw the line at
the use of nuclear weapons. Some people who favor some wars with limited use of force
become at some point anti-war. In the issue of a problem pregnancy this is also true in
some measure because pregnancy is a process—a continuing line; the beginning is not
the same as the end. Time makes a difference. At some time on the continuum line of
pregnancy, most all of us become anti-abortion.
Each stage of fetal development injects new moral and ethical questions into the issue of
the freedom to terminate. That was one of the geniuses of Roe v. Wade: the recognition of
the continuum line in which time tempered the freedom of the individual to terminate a

pregnancy. Some say that recognition in time may come back to haunt the decision with
the continued advance of medical technology’s ability to push back the time of viability.
My understanding of free choice is that the right to choose is a God-given right with
which persons are endowed. Without choice, life becomes a meaningless routine and
humans become robots. Freedom of choice is what makes us human and responsible.
And for women, the preeminent freedom is the choice to control her reproductive
process. Any theological or moral arguments that subordinate a woman’s freedom to the
imaginary screams of a fetus in early pregnancy or the value of a unique and
irreplaceable genetic code in an embryo will be less than human, no matter how much
talk there is about the “preciousness of life.”
The anti-choice minority, early on in this struggle, captured the clever slogan “right to
life” and they have rallied a number of unthinking and confused advocates to their side.
Slogans (on both sides), though they many be expedient for 30-second sound bites or
even arousing emotions, are seldom useful guides to ethical decision-making.
“Right to life” is such a simple slogan. It seems so indisputable, such an unarguable

verity, but only in an oversimplified world of one-dimensional morality where
“biological determination” is an ultimate value, supreme over all other considerations,
including human intentions. In the view of the absolute anti-abortionist, the biological
process is ordained as the Ultimate Good so that an ovum, an embryo, or a fetus is
endowed with divine rights that supersede all human reasons for its termination — even
the mother’s life! For those who know their religious history, the deification of the
conceptus is as heretical an idolatry as any pagan practice whereby a human was
sacrificed for the sake of some idolized animal, stone, or tree. The most popular idolatry
we modern humans engage in is to take a partial, finite and limited truth and by the
alchemy of a kind of moral insolence convert it into an absolute value or idol. But that is
precisely what these religious anti-choice people do. On the basis of this spurious heresy
of the deification of the fetus, they consign a woman to bear and care for the result of
conception so that body, mind and spirit are bound by a biological determination and
prevent her from ever knowing true liberty.
Furthermore, if “right to life” is simply a crusade’s slogan and what is really meant is the
right to be born, then our religious traditions speak to that issue. In my own religious
understanding, birth (being born) is never seen as anything but a gift—a miraculous,
marvelous, surprise present—a gift of God and a woman stranger. To speak of being born
as a right is to jar the sensibilities; to speak of “birth on demand” strains the moral syntax
of existence.
We are born (hopefully) of a woman’s free will and human intention, at the cost of real
physical pain and nourishing care. Birth ought never to be forced, compelled or mandated
by another person or the state itself. Rights begin with birth—they are a birthday
present—birthright. Now we are born and now we have rights, but even then the rights
are not absolute or indisputable. Even after birth our rights are fought for, deemed and

balanced against those who are already here and whose own rights limit and confine our
own.
All of you know Sisela Bok’s incredible analogy of the drowning man’s right to be
rescued at the risk of another person’s life. Only in a world of make-believe does
everybody have a right to everything. But in the real and imperfect world we live in, even
life is not an absolute right but a gift of God’s grace and other people’s courage, sacrifice
and love.
Another battleground in the struggle for women’s reproductive freedom was established
shortly after Roe v. Wade and seriously impaired this landmark decision. This
battleground was political and legal. The politicization of the abortion issue started with
Richard Nixon’s 1972 campaign but came to real fruition in the 1980 campaign of
Ronald Reagan, when he brought together the Catholic Bishops Conference and the
fundamentalist and evangelical Protestants known as the “moral majority.” This became
the Religious Right Coalition, which captured the Republican Party.
But perhaps nothing did more damage to the effectiveness of Roe v. Wade than the Hyde
Amendment, which was passed in 1976 and restricted payments for abortions with
Federal funds. It was and still is a heartless and unconscionable effort at the abrogation of
the Supreme Court decision. This law made it a lot clearer and more painful that in this
society, only our principles and some of our laws are equal and just, but our practices are
those of a two-class nation—Black and White, poor and prosperous—and to most poor
women nothing much changed with that “landmark decision.” Once again, in real life, it
is clearly evident that freedom of speech never meant much if hunger made you too weak
to talk and freedom of choice doesn’t mean much if you haven’t the money to travel and
pay for an abortion, and my friends, we are talking about the most fundamental freedom a
woman possesses.
I would submit that there is no human right so precious to a woman as the right to choose
the time of her childbearing and conversely, there is no law so oppressive and no
economic policy so dehumanizing as that which consigns a woman, because she is poor,
to involuntary servitude on behalf of an unwanted burden for unnumbered years of her
life. And all of this in the name of a highly speculative and ersatz “theology” that
declares an embryo has the God-given and constitutional rights of an adult human being!
Beyond the economic barriers to the Court’s decision, there are all of those other
obstacles of parental consent, waiting periods, forced propaganda counseling, etc., which
were further impediments to block the effect of Roe v. Wade.
These challenges grew in number after the Supreme Court decision of Webster v.
Missouri (which some have called the “balkanization of the abortion issue”) returning to
the state legislatures the right to pass laws contravening the “freedom of choice” decision.
So here we are in our present predicament. After financial restrictions limiting hospital
facilities where there are no clinics and denying the spread of facilities where women

could obtain abortions (we can call that geographical nullification of the laws), then
comes the “final solution” of the fanatics of the so-called “right to life” movement. It’s
probably wrong to call them “fanatics” or “extremists.” They were simply people who
believed enough in the rhetoric to carry it to its logical conclusion.
But now we have premeditated violence (arson, bombings, murder and mayhem against
facilities and the helping professions in the clinics). This is the desperate and ultimate
step, for religious terrorists to frighten medical personnel, nurses and workers from
helping women exercise their free choice.
Where we are today in the struggle for women’s reproductive freedom is the same place
African-American women were after Brown v. Board of Education, which declared the
separation of races discriminatory. Some of you remember! You couldn’t comply with
the law without the National Guard and the federal marshals. When African-Americans
achieved the right to vote, that was a great milestone (so it was believed) until African-
Americans tried to register to vote—then there were threats, intimidation and murder of
those who tried to help them implement their freedom.
Brown v. Board and Roe v. Wade are landmark decisions, symbols of liberties, but that’s
only what they are—symbols—as long as the forces of nullification continue to make
those few freedoms impractical or impossible. How much progress do you think we have
made in the integration of schools in some 40 years? Not much. How much progress in
over two decades have we made in enabling all women to exercise their reproductive
rights? Not enough!
For all those who care about women’s reproductive freedom, the unfinished liberation
calls all of us to a vision far beyond what we now have. We’re not in danger of losing
Roe v. Wade; our peril is that we will not continue the fight to make that decision real for
all women! A vision of a time and place where the unfulfilled promises of that law will
come to fruition:
• A time and place where every woman, rich or poor, rural or urban, single or married,
teenager or middle-aged, will have access to the knowledge and means of controlling
her reproductive capacity.
• A time and place where if that knowledge and means fail (and they will), every
woman, regardless of race, poverty, or geography will find a medical facility to
terminate her unwanted and unplanned pregnancy.
• A time and place where clinics of choice will be communities of compassion, open
and inviting, without fear, and utterly private—quiet spaces where the noises of
ranting intolerance and inhuman protests will be silent.
• A time and place where people who care about this issue will stop yelling across
barricades, will lower the decibels of our sloganeering defenses and sit down together
to face the complex new moral issues that medical technology in the field of
neonatology has raised for us.

This leads me to raise a much more difficult question for those of us who take an
uncompromising stand on “free choice.” Ought we or can we engage in dialogue about
this troublesome issue? Are we certain enough in our convictions, confident enough in
the power of our arguments to sit down at the table and talk? Originally I thought the
dialogue ought to happen between us and the “anti-abortion” people (not the right to life
fanatics, but the far more numerous conservatives who just don’t believe it’s right). But
I’m not sure that could be fruitful or even possible. Rather, it should be an internal debate
among those of us who understand the preciousness of a woman’s freedom and the
complexity of the issue.
The dialogue must begin with the admission that having an abortion is not a political
question (even though anti-abortion supporters were the ones to politicize the question).
Rather, the act of having an abortion is the most deeply personal act dealing with a
woman’s feelings about life, the power of creation and the survival of the species. And if
we are to enter a dialogue, the conversation cannot be seen as a “threat to the rights of
women but rather as the enhancement of the responsible exercise of those rights”
(Frances Kissling).
If we believe abortion as an issue has its complexities, then it makes dialogue a necessity.
The polls point out the complexity. In 1990, 73 percent of Americans were in favor of
abortion rights, while 77 percent regarded abortion as some kind of destruction of life.
Therefore most Americans are both for free choice as a principle and against abortion for
themselves. “One has to know nothing else to realize how complicated a problem we
have both before and within us” (Roger Rosenblatt).
Rosenblatt calls this bifurcated way of thinking “very American as it embraces both
contradiction and ambiguity.” It seems that what most of us want to do about abortion is
permit it but discourage it. Only ideologists or extremists fail to see those are grounds on
which conservatives and liberals might agree.
The reason for this ambiguity is the nature of the fetus. While we are certain that it is not
a human being, equal in any way to the life of the mother, it is a form of “potential life.”
What this might mean is: even though abortion is not tantamount to murder, it is more
than having a tooth pulled or an appendix removed. It becomes, perhaps, always an act
less desirable and at times irresponsible. Frances Kissling makes this point concisely:
Acknowledging fetal life as valuable and as an important factor in

decision-making about abortion need not be linked to a specific religious
doctrine. The Christian respect for life has never required the absolute
protection of life. It does not require conferring personhood or rights on
the fetus, nor does it suggest limiting the legal rights of women to decide
whether to bring new life into the world or to have an abortion (Kissling,
ibid).

An agreement on the value of the fetus as “potential life” could enhance the dialogue and
move us beyond the absolutist interpretation of the fundamental rights articulated in Roe
v. Wade. (Does anyone here want to defend the right of a woman to terminate her
pregnancy in the third trimester because she discovers that the one to be born is the
wrong sex?)
In an issue as ambiguous and complex as abortion, absolutist positions on either side are
both unhelpful and out-of-place. In order to illustrate that claim, we need to look at some
of the moral questions that the advances of medical technology in the field of
neonatology have raised for us — questions about the rights and responsibilities of a
woman pregnant with “potential life.”
For example, in different parts of the country, hospitals have obtained court orders to
force women to undergo cesarean sections because doctors felt that their “fetal patients”
required them. The most publicized was one where the woman refused a cesarean
because God meant for her to have her baby the normal way (even if it might die or be
severely retarded in normal childbirth). Didn’t you find yourself a little conflicted about
who should win that court case?
Remember, Roe v. Wade says that the state has a right to protect the fetus after viability.
In cases where there is an arbitrary threat to the termination or endangerment of fetal life
by the woman’s behavior, such as drug abuse, women are being threatened with
incarceration. What are the rights of pregnant women who are substance abusers? Should
they be restrained or punished for child abuse? What if the drug is nicotine or alcohol?
What happens to the rights of a woman to control her own body? What about having
unsafe sex during pregnancy? Is there any liability for having a baby born with HIV?
Because of neonatal advances, there is a further question of removing unwanted fetuses

and keeping them alive in “mechanical wombs.” The question is whether pro-choice
means the right not to bear a child or whether it means also the right not to “beget” a
child, i.e., the right to choose not to bring into the world life embodying one’s genetic
heritage.
Or take the issue seen from the other side of the problem involving little Portia Davis,
who resides in Children’s Hospital, Washington, DC. She is two years old now. She sits
strapped in a wheelchair. Her tiny pointed head jerks mildly as she passes from seizure to
seizure. She has virtually no brain, and although her eyes are open, she is completely
unresponsive and unaware of her surroundings. But the real tragedy of little Portia Davis,
according to her parents, is that she never should have been born at all. They say their
child is a victim of a medical system gone berserk!
Can we find justification for not withholding treatment in the ICU nursery once the full
truth is known? Are there some things worse than “death” for some premature infants? If
so, how do we make those decisions and what do we call it? Would we not find that the

answer to the foregoing questions would cut across pro and con positions on the abortion
issue?
The same difficulty arises in the late trimester and the day after birth when we are making
a moral decision about withdrawing life support—whether it’s in the mother’s womb or
the high-tech incubator.
One of the arguments that has divided us is whether or when the fetus is or becomes a
human being, and we may never reach agreement on this. I remember Joshua Lederberg,
the Nobel Prize-winning geneticist, responding to this question, saying that philosophers
and theologians would first have to tell him what they meant by “human” before he could
tell them at what point in the development of life a human being could be said to exist.
But whether we can ever agree on this issue, one thing on which we all can agree—both
pro-choice and anti-choice—is that the longer the pregnancy progresses, the harder the
justification for termination ought to be. Most of us do not have much trouble at any
point in the pregnancy if the life of the mother is threatened, even if the baby to be born
promises to be a full-term, healthy child. It seems to me at that point we have already
made the case for “justifiable infanticide,” i.e., to save the life of the mother—known in
criminal law as a plea of “self-defense.”
But many of us who agree with the rationale object vigorously to any thought of
terminating the pregnancy of an organically disabled and grossly retarded fetus (in the
third trimester) whose birth and continued life will bring immeasurable pain and suffering
to the child and its parents (over its lifetime). It seems to me we may be engaging here in
a kind of moral gymnastics that defies the gravity of principle.
Another question we need to be wrestling with—those of us on both sides of the issue of

choice—is where we stand on compulsory abortion. I’m proud of Hillary Clinton for
attacking China’s treatment of women’s rights, but it’s a little too easy to attack
compulsory abortion in a nation where the living population was threatened with
starvation if the population was not curbed. What can be attacked is a solution that results
in orphanages full of baby girls abandoned and sometimes killed.
Some communities have not been far from compulsory abortion. In places where mothers
are heavily addicted and severely harming children before birth, is it reasonable for the
state to decide that a mandated abortion is called for? Is that so far from charging a
pregnant woman with child abuse and incarcerating her as a criminal?
How about women who bear several children who are addicted to crack or HIV positive?
Haven’t you heard yourself say silently, “She ought to be stopped from bearing children,
maybe sterilized?”
When you try to apply our old pro-choice cliché, “A woman’s body is her own, keep your
hands off,” it rings kind of hollow before circumstances like these. But on the other hand,

imprisoning pregnant women for bad behavior sounds like the ultimate in slippery slopes.
But for those of us whose only criterion is the woman’s rights, it does make us feel a little
more concern for the unborn’s life.
Well, I could go on with these hard questions, full of complexity and ambiguity, that will
put all our moral and theological absolutes to rest.
Now, my friends, raising these difficult questions does not mean that I believe that the
dialogue is more important than assuring the freedom of all women to have a choice in
their reproductive alternatives. But without considering these hard questions that confront
us along with the advances of medical technology, we may lose our moral integrity.
I think it ought to be clear to all of us that we will not find peace and stability around this
issue without the leadership of our religious communities—preachers, pontiffs, rabbis
and teachers—speaking out of the best of their traditions. The churches and their
theologians are responsible for much of the present climate. Fundamentalists in all
religions are doing the damage, but the great silent majority of Protestants, Jews and
Catholics created the vacuum. Don’t you think it strange that not a single Jesuit moral
theologian belonging to an order trained in the mastery of casuistry (the process of
relating the demand of love to the service of the neighbor, also known as “theological
rationalization”) has come up with an ethical defense of abortion performed because of
rape or incest?
It is not even a matter of whether you believe in abortion or not, but whether one’s faith
enables us to speak out loud and clear against public displays of intolerance, bigotry,
hatred and violence and plead for the acceptance of our differences, if not in love at least
with understanding and civility. It’s the least we can do, we clergy and lay persons of
faith, to break the silence of fear and speak and act out of faith, with toleration and
compassion for those people who believe differently and act in obedience to their
consciences. Only then can we hope for an end to the religious warfare, without which
our democratic ideal is impossible. Those of us with strong religious conviction about
reproductive freedom have a significant role to play.

Seeing the World Through Women’s Eyes
Reverend Bernice Powell Jackson
On July 29, 1994, Dr. John Bayard Britton and his escort James H. Barrett were shot and killed in front of
an abortion clinic in Pensacola, Florida. The next year, the Religious Coalition decided to hold its annual
conference in Pensacola to show support for a community beleaguered by violence and distrust. Returning
from the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, China, Reverend Jackson delivered the following
keynote address to the Coalition conference on September 18, 1995. Reverend Jackson is the executive
director of the Commission for Racial Justice of the United Church of Christ.
The theme for the Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) Forum in China was “Seeing
the World Through Women’s Eyes.” I was struck by that theme and I was even more
struck by the idea of what the world would be like if it did see through women’s eyes.
Think about it. What would the government be like if it saw the world through women’s
eyes? What would corporations be like if they saw the world through women’s eyes?
What would the United Nations be like if it saw the world through women’s eyes? What
would our churches and synagogues and mosques be like if they saw the world through
women’s eyes? I must admit, I can’t even imagine it. All I can say is that I am sure it
would be different, very different.
For me, it all boils down to the question: what if we truly believed that man and woman
were created in the image of God? For three years I had the blessing of working with
Archbishop Desmond Tutu. One of the most powerful moments I spent with that man of
God was at a women’s prison in upstate New York. I had asked him if he would visit the
women on one of his visits and he replied immediately, “Why not on this one?” And he
asked that we visit them on a particular day, which I later found out was the 25th
anniversary of his ordination. The sermon he preached to these women was that each of
them was created in the image of God. As they listened to that message and it crept into
their very being, something powerful and almost incredible happened. I can only say to
you that the Holy Spirit was among us as these women, branded and debased by society,
realized that they were created in the image of God. That, for me, was seeing God
through the eyes of women.
And that’s the perspective I’d like to take for the next few minutes—to see the world and
especially the issues we are facing in this country through women’s eyes and, if I can be
even more personal, through this woman’s eyes, through this African-American,
God-fearing and God-loving woman’s eyes.
Viewed through a woman’s eyes, through this woman’s eyes, I must say that as we enter
a new century and a new millennium, I believe that the United States is facing
unprecedented challenges and probably unprecedented dangers. I believe that women,
particularly poor women and people of color, are facing unprecedented challenges and
unprecedented dangers. But with those challenges and dangers come opportunities and
possibilities of rebirth, healing, renewal and justice.

There’s a feeling alive out there, you can almost physically feel it in the air. It’s a feeling
that the world is out of control and that those people in charge of the government,
business, the church—all need to be thrown out so that the control can be regained. As
Middle America feels more and more at risk, they become increasingly conservative,
frantically holding on to so-called family values, mindless patriotism, religious
fundamentalism, racism, homophobia and visions of keeping women barefoot and
pregnant in the kitchen. As the poor become poorer, they are tidily labeled the permanent
underclass and find themselves living in ungovernable, broken down, insolvent walled-
off cities where they are increasingly forced to turn to drugs and against themselves.
These surroundings foster an anger which ferments and churns beneath the surface of
calm.
Meanwhile, we have the quiet but steady growth of right-wing extremism. Now if this
meeting had been held a year ago, before the Oklahoma City bombing, even some of us
here in this room might have stopped listening once I got to this part. Oh, we know about
clinic bombings and shootings, but thinking about more than that is almost too
frightening to deal with. Oklahoma City changed all of that. We must understand the
linkages between those good ol’ boys who run around in the woods in Idaho and
Wyoming with guns, Terry McVeigh and his kind, and those who shoot clinic doctors.
We must also attempt to understand that the political conversation now has so radically
right a center that a man like Dr. Henry Foster, a good doctor, a good human being, a
man who has spent all his life working for the health and the rights of women, especially
poor women, could be defeated without the Senate even taking a vote. We’ve got to
understand right-wing extremism and the politically right center in which we live right
now.
If we’re going to see the world through women’s eyes, then we must see it also through
poor women’s eyes. Let’s not kid ourselves, the lot of poor women has never been easy.
But over the past few months the rhetoric seems to be increasing and we now find poor
women demonized by politicians looking for easy answers to difficult questions such as
balancing our national budget, eliminating an incredible deficit caused by tax cuts for the
wealthy and unneeded defense spending and dealing with an economy that has real,
systemic and sustained problems. As more and more white men are forced out of jobs
permanently, as more and more Americans see the so-called American dream being
challenged, as they recognize that their children will not live even as well as they do now,
as we experience an economic revolution rivaling the Industrial Revolution of a century
ago, poor women, who are not there to speak for themselves, are increasingly being
designated the scapegoats.
The rhetoric seems to be increasing and now we find poor women being demonized and
we envision those age-old images of lazy, cheating, morally lax women. We hear only
the stories of those women whose families have been caught up in generations of poverty
and welfare, not the stories of those poor women working at minimum-wage jobs while
attending school and raising their families alone. Not the stories of those women who

struggle along with little or no help from their children’s father. Not the stories of the
grandmothers whose daughters have been lost to violence or crack cocaine or HIV/AIDS,
who are now raising their grandchildren or even great-grandchildren with little or no
help. Not the stories of those women struggling to learn how to read, write and raise their
children while moving from shelter to shelter, because the reality is there are hundreds of
thousands of women who have no bed to tuck their children into at night.
One out of every four American children is poor today. And while we rank near the
bottom of western, industrialized nations when it comes to income of poor families with
children, we are also at the top of the list of wealthiest children. The poorest of the poor
amidst the richest of the rich. It is a spiritually impoverished and ethically confused
nation that allows its children to be the poorest of the poor.
What does all of this have to do with the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice? In
the midst of the demonization is the attempt to take away the choices of poor women—
the few choices they may have in life—the choices about how they live their own lives.
Take away choices about whether or not to have children. Take away choices about how
many children to have. Take away choices about how old they can be when they have
children. Take away choices about whether they leave their children home alone or with
substandard or even dangerous child care if they do get a job. Take away choices about
whether they can afford to take their sick child to a doctor. Take away choices about
whether they will have job training available to them—their only possible hope of escape
from lives of poverty and neglect.
Now, if you can look at the world through the eyes of a poor woman, try looking at it
through the lens of a poor African-American woman. Add racism to the mix. Imagine
what it is like for a poor, Black mother raising her children in our nation’s cities.
Knowing her children are twice as likely to die as infants as white children. Knowing
they are twice as likely to die from gunshots. Imagine what it is like to raise male
children wondering every morning whether your child will return home. Imagine having
to teach your children urban survival skills—what to do if shots ring out and what to do if
stopped by police. There are mothers in South Central Los Angeles who put their babies
to bed in their bathtubs to protect them from stray bullets. Every four hours a Black child
dies from gun violence in this country. Every four hours.
Then there are the schools. Imagine knowing the odds are against your child ever
finishing high school because the majority of our children will never finish high school in
a society that requires more and more skills such as computer literacy.
Imagine what it is like for those thousands of African-American and Latina women living
with HIV and AIDS, knowing they will probably not live to see their child grow up.
That’s what life looks like through the eyes of a poor Black woman right now. Not many
choices and those few are being challenged. That’s what it means to see the world
through women’s eyes.

What am I, as the Executive Director of the Commission for Racial Justice, doing
addressing this meeting? What does all of this mean for and to people of faith who
believe that each woman is created in the image of God and therefore has the power, the
intelligence and the faith to make good choices about her own body and her own life?
It means that we must do exactly what we are doing here in Pensacola. We are saying we
must work in new coalitions and build some new bridges between communities. It means
we must build anti-racist coalitions of people of good will. It means we must say we see
what is going on around us—we see the violence, we hear the violent language, we see
the attempts to cut dollars for reproductive services for women, we see the attempts to go
back to the good ol’ days, and we say no. We say no to violence—all violence—clinic
violence, domestic violence, drive-by violence. We say no one who wishes to receive
information about her choices should experience violence or coercion. We say no one
who performs abortions or counsels women should experience violence or threats. We
say a woman’s right to make all the choices about her own life and those of her family is
a fundamental human right that most Americans believe in. We say poor women should
not die from self-induced abortions any more than rich women should. We say women
who have been victims of rape and incest have a right to choose, and our loving, creating
God does not require them to have those children. To say otherwise is not religious or
right.
We must do what we are doing here in Pensacola and admit, so proudly, that we are
women and men of good faith who commit ourselves to redefining, to enlarging our very
definition of who we are so that we truly become a multiracial, multicultural, multiclass,
anti-racist movement dedicated to providing all women reproductive health and
reproductive choice. Multiclass. Anti-racist. My friends, we have got to break down the
barriers and the walls of race and class if we are to really exist in the hearts and minds of
our nation. We’ve got to get rid of the things that divide us. We must get rid of the racism
found not only in us as human beings, but in our institutions, our churches.
I heard the women on the panel yesterday afternoon calling on this organization, and any
organization that wants to work in communities of color in our nation, to commit itself to
broadening the table and broadening the related issues, to commit itself not just verbally
and superficially, but to really share power in leadership, power in decision-making and
power in allocating resources. I heard the women say we must respect each others’
differences and know that what works for your community might not work in mine. I
heard them say we’ve got some work to do in our own communities—some basic
educational work, some dialogical work, some theological work to do in our own
communities. Let us do it. Help us do it.
Let me be specific and personal. Look around you. What is missing in this group? There
are some people of color groups missing. But there are really men of color missing.
We’ve got work to do in our communities. It’s not just Catholic women giving up
personal power to the Pope. The Black preacher is the pope to some women.

I heard the women yesterday saying that we have to work hard at communication and
language. We assume that because we are all speaking English, we’re all saying the same
thing. Do you know how the word pro-choice is often translated in the African-American
community? Pro-genocide. You can dismiss it. You can ridicule it. You can deny it.
You’ve got to get beyond the intent to the impact.
Last week I was talking with a psychology professor at a meeting. During a break he told
me the story of teaching his students about communication and conversation. One of their
assignments was to have five conversations and then put them in writing.
He told me how one student chose to have a conversation with her grandmother about
abortion because she was sure they didn’t agree on it. But she found her grandmother did
approve of a woman’s right to have an abortion. In fact, she had had one as a young teen.
It had been performed by her father, who was a medical doctor and was also the one who
had impregnated her. Seeing the world through women’s eyes.
These, then, my friends, are the issues which I believe are critical for us to deal with as
we seek to discern God’s will for us in the new century. Do I believe that we can do it?
Absolutely, yes. Do I believe that we will do it? I live in hope. I live in the same hope as
the psalmist who wrote Psalm 15, whose words we sang last night.
I live in the same hope as the poet Maya Angelou when she wrote “On the Pulse of the
Morning” for President Clinton’s inauguration, a poem celebrating all of our glorious
past and calling us to a new day. Hear the final verse of that wonderful poem:
Here, on the pulse of this new day,

You may have the grace to look up and out
And into your sister’s eyes,
And into your brother’s face,
Your country,
And say simply
With hope—
Good morning.

Experiences in Faith:
Remarks for California Republican League
Reverend Ann Hayman
For nearly 20 years Reverend Hayman has served as the program director of the Mary Magdalene Project,
a ministry of the Presbyterian Church that provides alternatives to women involved in street prostitution.
Reverend Hayman also is the chair of the Leadership Team of the Southern California Religious Coalition
for Reproductive Choice. The following speech was delivered to the California Republican League on
September 26, 1998.
When Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, she envied her sister;
and said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I shall die!” Jacob’s anger was
kindled against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, who has
withheld from you the fruit of the womb?” (Genesis 30:1,2)
My Experience
I live in a very different world than do most of you. Now, I was raised in your world. My
parents are both card-carrying Republicans and my paternal grandfather was a
Presbyterian minister. Rest assured, those values still define on a daily basis my
experience.
I would like to take a quick survey—a show of hands. I’d like to know how many of you
have a problem-free or a trouble-free life? No one has a problem-free life. And yet,
somewhere out there lurks the myth that we should not have problems. There is the ideal
of a perfect world without suffering, without hard choices, without tension. We call it
“family values.” You all know what I’m talking about. It is a white, middle-class world
where men make the decisions, women stay home and raise children and pets and we are
all well-educated and go to church. The reality is that this is not normative for more than
half the world. Families come in a multitude of sizes, shapes and descriptions, almost half
of our households have no adult male in them, we are not white and we do not live in the
suburbs. We all have problems, and we approach our problems, we solve our problems,
by bringing resources, information and technology to bear on them. As people of faith we
also engage in prayer, meditation and fellowship.
Unfortunately, some pregnancies are not perfect either. How many of you know a woman
who has had an unplanned or a problem pregnancy? It is a no-win situation. There is no
“happy ever after” to a problem pregnancy. Only hard choices, suffering and stress.
Terry was an 18-year-old mentally ill prostitute when I first met her. She had been
incested by her mother’s boyfriend since age 5. She had her first child, a daughter, at 14
and the State of California promptly stepped in and took her and placed her for adoption.
Terry has never recovered from that loss. Twenty years later she is pregnant for the ninth
time. She has had two live births, three abortions and four miscarriages. Her first abortion

was at age 12. She was pregnant by her mother’s boyfriend. Her daughter was fathered
by a sailor on shore leave whom she met while hanging around the docks in San Diego
where she lived. Her son was fathered by a bus driver in Atlanta. Her current boyfriend is
an unemployed mechanic.
Terry’s life will never be problem-free. She makes her moves based on her need to
survive given rather minimal options and often inadequate resources. She is a trained
cosmetologist and, like her mother, a welfare recipient. Her emotional state is unstable.
Eventually the State of California will step in and take from her these children and her
grief will be compounded and her mental health shattered.
My Experience Expanded
Now, most of us sitting in this room know exactly how we feel about abortion, and we
each carry with us our own personal experiences or the experiences of our friends and
loved ones. I have never met a woman who got pregnant just so that she could have an
abortion. I have never met a women with an unplanned or problem pregnancy that I could
not trust to make the best decision regarding that pregnancy, often with little support and
great distress frequently compounded tenfold by the rhetoric of the anti-abortion
movement. Yes, even Terry makes decisions that I trust. I don’t always like the decisions
she makes, but I trust her to make them.
Terry is a child of Godde. Godde watches over her. I believe that Godde alone is the
sovereign arbiter of Terry’s or any woman’s conscience. She truly believes that Godde is
with her through the many “valleys of the shadow of death” that she walks and the
despair that she so often feels. She attends church, she prays to be forgiven, she struggles
to survive.
Our Traditions
Scripture makes no explicit mention of induced abortion, whether in approval or

prohibition, but we know from studying pre-Judaic Hittite documents that abortion was
practiced in biblical times. It was the sole domain of women—midwifery was the
reproductive health option of the day—it was women with herbal remedies helping other
women. We must remember that childbearing as a medical event is a fairly recent
development. I was the first generation in my family to have been born in a hospital. That
was in 1949. Both of my parents were born at home. (Male) doctor-assisted delivery has
only been normative during this century.
According to The Covenant of Life and the Caring Community (a Presbyterian document)
Scripture abounds with references to childbearing; in fact in Hebrew Scripture,

images of salvation and immortality are intimately connected to the procreation of
children. Even though there must have been frequent problems associated with
pregnancy and childbirth in biblical times, the Scriptures are largely silent about

the details, for their focus is a theological one…Hebrew Scriptural references to
childbearing, however, must be read in terms of the context of the nation Israel—
a struggling tribal people, eking out an existence under adverse conditions.
Children were needed for labor and for security in old age and were desired as a
sign of God’s blessing. Not to be able to bear children was perceived as a sign of
God’s disfavor and the cause of great anguish. (pg. 10)
So why, if there is no direct reference to abortion in Scripture, is Scripture so often quoted

in relationship to reproductive health issues? It is because as people of faith we turn to the
Book of Life as one of our resources when we have problems. We bring to our reading of
Scripture experiences that are very diverse and often complex. Sometimes we are looking
for easy answers, sometimes we just want to proof text, sometimes we have a deep
spiritual need and are seeking direction, sometimes we want to prove a point. Whatever
our tradition(s), we read and use Scripture based on our own agendas. As people of faith
we seek the truth, as Christians we have been taught that the truth will set us free.
And the truth can be hard to hear. It can also make us very angry and upset. What if I
were to tell you that for a young girl who has been incested most of her childhood, to
choose prostitution is a very liberating experience? It’s the truth. In prostitution she can
take control over her life in ways she could never do at home. What if I were to tell you
that battering and incest are greater in churched families than in non-churched families.
Its the truth. It’s also very hard to hear.
Much of the abortion debate in the United States is about the appropriate social roles of
white women. Our reproductive choices are shaped by our cultural, political and
economic contexts. The Jewish-Christian tradition is centered around a longing for Life.
Yet, it has never made biological human existence an absolute value. Varying levels of
crucifixion, martyrdom, human sacrifice (as in the story of Abraham and Isaac), honoring
those who give up their lives for others, display the deeper belief that the life we long for,
the life Godde promises and gives, is not mere biological existence. This, combined with
the “way of life” discussed in Deuteronomy 30:15, which sets before us a sort of
“spiritual life,” allows us to stand in a honest relationship with Godde in the context of
human community where justice and mercy prevail.
What is the truth of being “pro-life?” If we really are “pro-life,” then why are we 4,000
foster homes short in LA County? If we really are “pro-life,” then why are there 40,000
children in LA living in foster care? If we really are “pro-life,” then why do we keep
spending more money building prisons than we spend on education in this state? If we
really are “pro-life,” then why do we expect a welfare mother to support a family of five
on an eight-dollar-an-hour job? “Pro-life?” I assure you that life does not begin at
conception and end at birth.
There is nothing romantic about growing up abused, unloved and unwanted. There is
nothing romantic about growing up in poverty. Suffering does not for the most part build
character—it only detracts from the quality of one’s life. These are the very human

concerns to which Scripture speaks and, indeed, very hard truths to hear.
Re-mything Our Traditions
Perhaps no other issue melds together politics and religion like abortion and issues of
reproductive freedom do. This is reflected in our gubernatorial race and in the results of a
field poll taken this month which found that about two-thirds of all California voters,
including 57 percent of Republicans, continue to believe women should have the right to
choose. We have been lied to by the anti-abortion folk; their secrets are dark and deep
and they delight in what they perceive to be silence from the “other side”—that’s us.
They attempt to speak for other people’s experience and that is wrong. They profess to
speak for all Christians and they don’t. They purport to speak for Godde and they don’t!
They identify specific biblical passages which they apply to the abortion question without
regard to context, literary form, or the history of the passage. They worship a male God
who is always in control:
“…intercourse results in this fertilization of this sperm and this ovum. They
quote the psalmist (Psalm 139) as “proof” that (their) God directly controls each
biological process in which the natural process of cell division begins. The only
response a woman can make when faced with this kind of theology is fatalist. She
must play out a role which (their male) God scripts, there is no freedom in (their)
God and no consideration taken for the many secondary causes of unintended or
problem pregnancies: biology and the lack of reliable contraceptives, biology
and male violence, biology and youthful error, biology and poverty, biology and
lack of information about sexuality and so on. Women must not be defined solely
or primarily by biological capacity.” (Abortion in Good Faith, page 42)
As people of faith we are sources of living spiritual wisdom. As people of faith we must
recognize that people are dying for the truth. If we truly believe in Godde’s providence,
Godde’s ordering of the future, then we as humans face a future of infinite possibilities.
(Abortion in Good Faith, pg. 26)
What are our deepest values? How do we feel about an ideological shift that makes a
fetus a patient and a person? Nowhere in Scripture either Hebrew or Christian are any
such claims made. If we value human life—even find it sacred—then we must
acknowledge the fact that frequent pregnancies are not good for women’s health. What
are we willing to say to a medical technology that keeps miscarriages alive and how will
we address the presence of more frequent fetal monitoring during the third trimester,
which will undoubtedly discover even greater numbers of fetal abnormalities and health
risks to the mother?
And what are we willing to do regarding teen pregnancy? Even though the numbers are
in decline, there are still too many children having children. This epidemic reflects a
number of factors, the first being meaninglessness in young girls’ lives, the second is a

lack of reliable information about sexuality, the third is isolation—they have no one with
whom to talk—and the fourth is that all the rhetoric about abortion from the anti-abortion
crowd has made abortion not an option for many of them.
Do we really trust women to make the “hard” choices? Are we willing to

empower every woman to make responsible choices regarding her use of the
abilities and opportunities she has contributed to the fullness of life? Abortion
issues raise most profoundly the challenge to see each woman as a unique and
capable human person and moral agent who may (or may not) choose to
contribute biological life as her gift to the life we all share. The question of
reproductive options asks us if we are ready to accept what God may be doing
through the intellectual and spiritual contributions women are eager to bring; to
reform ourselves as new occasions, as God’s providence, may demand.
(Abortion in Good Faith, pg. 41-42)
I close my remarks with the voices of women:
From the Episcopal Women’s Caucus (1978):
We are deeply disturbed over the increasingly bitter and divisive battle
being waged in legislative bodies to force continuance of unwanted
pregnancies and to limit an American woman’s right to abortion.
We believe that all should be free to exercise their own consciences on

this matter and that where widely differing views are held by substantial
sections of the American religious community, the particular belief of one
religious body should not be forced on those who believe otherwise.
To prohibit or severely limit the use of public funds to pay for abortions
abridges and denies the right to an abortion and discriminates especially
against low income, young and minority women. (We Affirm, page 13)
From a woman delivering her first child:
It was all so different than I had imagined. Bright lights, machines

clicking, people coming in and poking and probing but never telling me
what was happening. What did women do before all this stuff existed?
We’ve been having babies for centuries; when did it get so complicated?
A pastor talking to a woman who just suffered a miscarriage:
It must have been God’s will. Don’t worry—you can always have
another baby.
From the mother of a premature baby:

I wanted to love Joshua, but I felt the need to protect myself from having
him, too. I worried that every day we spent together would make it harder
to lose him. In spite of ourselves we grew to love him, even as his life
became more and more fragile and we saw him slipping away from us.
We wanted him to come home, to live with us, to be normal—but we knew
that wasn’t possible. As the days went on I found that I got used to the
idea that he was going to die. He was a very special part of our lives,
even if for a short time…
And from a 16-year-old girl:
I knew I was pregnant from the very moment—and I knew from the core
of my being that it was wrong. Even though I love children, I had no doubt
that an abortion would be the right thing in this particular situation. That
was five years ago, and every time I think about it I always have the same
feeling—relief, almost a sense of deliverance. It would have been
unbearable to have had to live with that mistake for a lifetime. My life was
changed in this experience, transformed. I like to think I’m stronger now,
more able to be my own person. I can’t help think that making that
decision was probably the beginning of a new life for me. It was probably
when I became an adult…

Sermons

Faithful Witness for Choice
The Reverend Dr. Katherine Hancock Ragsdale
Chair of the Board of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice from 1992-1999, the Reverend Dr.
Ragsdale delivered this sermon at the National Abortion Federation’s 1997 annual meeting in Boston,
Massachusetts. Reverend Ragsdale is vicar of St. David’s Episcopal Church in Pepperell, Massachusetts,
and a former staff officer at the Episcopal Church’s national offices.
It is indeed an honor to be invited to support in any small way the work of the National
Abortion Federation and of each of you. And it is a particular pleasure to be invited to
lead you in worship. I have some idea how hard you work. All of you. Doctors.
Administrators. Counselors. Activists. You work hard every day to meet the needs and to
protect the rights of others. It is demanding work. It is, unfortunately, dangerous work.
And it is work that never ends. So it is essential that you find space for rest and
refreshment and this, we hope, is that opportunity. It’s not a workshop, or a rally, or a day
at the office. It’s worship. It’s intended to be a time when you can stop and breathe and
center and remember who you are and why you do this work. This is our gift to you and it
is given in grateful appreciation for all you do.
I chose two texts for today’s service. It’s an unusual privilege for an episcopal priest to
choose the text on which she’ll preach. You usually get whatever comes up in the
lectionary and you have to find something to say about it. But this morning I got to
choose, and I chose Psalm 139 and the Beatitudes. So let me discuss each in order.
I chose Psalm 139 partially because I’ve always loved it. How can you not love it?
Whither shall I go from your spirit?

Or wither shall I flee from your presence?
If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there:
If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.
If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
I chose it because I love it. But I also chose it because it is so often used against us by the
anti-choice folks. And I think it’s important to be certain of what the Bible really says
about abortion. So, let me first tell you what the Bible says, then I’ll tell you why you
should care. Here’s what the Bible says about abortion…nothing. Nothing. Not one word.
Now folks will quote you this psalm to prove what the Bible says about abortion. “Look
at verse 13,” they’ll say: “For you created my inmost parts; you knit me together in my
mother’s womb.” “See?” they say, “That proves it. We are fully formed, protected
persons from the moment of conception.”

And then they go on to quote verse 15. “My body was not hidden from you, while I was
made in secret, and woven in the depths of the earth.” But note how another can say,
“See? The Bible proves it. We’re formed, fully human in the bowels of the earth and then
transplanted into our mother’s wombs. Beam me in, Scottie!” No, you don’t hear them
say that. Of course not. Because, as we've said this is not about abortion or human
gestation. It’s a psalm of love and praise that reflects the amazing omnipresence of God.
This psalm is not about abortion. The Bible does not speak of abortion. Now, don’t get
me wrong. I’m not suggesting that the opinions of the religious anti-choice people are not
formed and shaped by their interpretation of the Bible. I’m sure they are. But I am saying
that a more honest discourse would require them to stop pretending the Bible says
anything about abortion, that the Bible speaks clearly and unequivocally on the subject.
And instead say something like “I know the Bible doesn’t say anything on abortion, but
our understanding of its emphasis on protecting the weak leads us to believe that abortion
is always and necessarily wrong.” Then we could say, “That’s interesting. Our reading of
those same passages leads us to believe that abortion must be a safe, legal option for all
women.”
We’d still disagree, but we’d have an honest basis for talking that shows respect for one
another’s consciences, even in the midst of disagreement. Similarly, when they refer to an
embryo or a fetus as a baby, as if that were a fact and not a value judgment, they
deliberately render honest and respectable discourse impossible. It would be less
deceptive and manipulative if they were to say, “We see no moral distinction—no
difference in value—between an embryo and a baby and so must oppose abortion.” Then
we could say, “Really? We see a great deal of difference.” And we could then talk with
each other and to the world in a way that honestly reflects our very real differences but
does not distort the beliefs of our opponents.
The same thing applies when they show off those huge plastic fetuses big enough to
cuddle and say this is what you’re aborting. Now you know just as well as I do that 91
percent of abortions occur before the end of the first trimester. The big plastic dolls are a
lie. And the lies are dangerous, which is where we come to that question about why you
should care about what the Bible actually says about abortion. We need to be able to
unmask the whole realm of lies for the sake of the women and the families we serve and
care for, and in the interest of honest civil discourse and ethical discernment, and in order
to stop the violence.
Let me start with the violence. You’ve heard it said, and it’s undeniably true, that violent
rhetoric has led to violent action. But I will contend that violent rhetoric is the second
step down that dreadful path. The first step is the disregard for the consciences and values
of others. When anti-choice folk insist that they act on deeply faith-based convictions,
and fail to acknowledge that we do too, they begin the process of dehumanization and
demonization that marks us as fair game for violence. And it must stop.

We have to claim the faith commitments that undergird our work. The lying must stop.
And again, I hope you understand that I am not asking the pro-life folks not to speak their
minds and their consciences. I am not opposed to disagreement, even passionate
disagreement, as members of my family will attest. But I do believe that even the most
profound disagreements and debates should be characterized by truthfulness and respect
for the consciences of others. Civil discourse and ethical discernment depend on our
ability and willingness to disagree passionately yet still honestly and honorably. And so,
Sisters and Brothers, I ask you to honor the consciences of those who disagree with you,
and insist that they honor yours as well, and be clear that it is your conscience about
which they’re talking. Expect and embrace passionate debate, but demand that the debate
be characterized by mutual respect and peace. Debate fairly, but do not let courtesy keep
you from speaking the hard truths. This has been a common failing of the religious
community. We have to start speaking and demanding the truth.
I don’t know how many of you would identify yourselves as religious, but I doubt that
you’re in this work for money or glory. I would bet that you do it because your
conscience demands it of you. I would bet that your work is a reflection of your values
and faith commitments, and I hope that you will start saying so. Declare yourselves
prayerfully pro-choice everywhere you can, every chance you get. Do it to help change
the climate that nurtures violence. Do it also for the sake of a more honest public debate
and for the sake of a deeper, more comprehensible discourse.
I recently had the privilege of sitting on a panel at a medical school for a class on
abortion. It was a delightful experience—wonderful students, wonderful faculty, great
opportunity. But I have to tell you that I was appalled by the discourse between the
ethicist on the panel and some of the students. They kept talking about the ethics of
conscience and the importance of a conscience that allows caregivers who have qualms
about abortion the freedom not to be involved in any abortion procedures. But no one
mentioned—until I had had enough and jumped in—the disturbing implications of such
acts of conscience. No one asked whether it was ethical for someone who was not
prepared to provide the full range of reproductive services to become a gynecologist in
the first place. No one suggested that failure to provide care might be morally suspect or
that providing abortions might be an act of faith and conscience.
We have to remind people that we are prayerfully pro-choice so that our ethical
deliberations have balance and substance.
Finally, we have to say that we are prayerfully pro-choice because the women who we
care for need to hear it.
Let me say to you that as a parish priest, with a congregation of people who wrestle every
day with what it means to lead a faithful life in a complex modern world, I do not ever

again want to meet a woman—I have met way too many of them—who thought she had
to choose between her conscience and her faith community. Women who—when faced
with a problem pregnancy—read their Bibles, talked with their families, their doctors,
their counselors, prayed and prayed and prayed some more, and finally decided that
abortion was the most responsible option available to them; and then despaired because
that choice meant alienation from their faith community when they most needed its
support. And years later they are still haunted by the accusations, condemnations, and
disrespect heaped upon them by those who purport to speak in the name of God. You
know how important it is for many of those sisters to hear a different voice speaking in
the name of God, a voice which acknowledges the complexity of the decisions they face,
which respects their moral agency, and which celebrates their courage and faithfulness in
making hard decisions.
The fact of the matter is that they need to know that the vast majority of religious
Americans are pro-choice. And the vast majority of religious institutions are pro-choice.
And we are all pro-choice, not in spite of our faith, but because of it.
I think that it’s safe to say that all of us recognize and affirm that all life, indeed all
creation is sacred. And that part of being human is being able to hold all life and creation
in sacred trust. We also affirm that part and parcel of that responsibility is to be
responsible, moral, decision makers. And we know—only too well—that moral decision-
making involves more than making a bad choice or a good choice. My four-year-old
niece can do that. Moral decision-making is more complicated than that. It isn’t a matter
of plugging all variables into a pre-determined formula to find the ethically appropriate
answer. Ethical decision-making always involves weighing competing needs and costs
and making the complex, moral decisions that are unique to complex, moral
circumstances. Ethical decision-making involves living in a difficult and uncertain realm
of ambiguity. Our faiths do not teach us that God will deliver us from the realms of
ambiguity. Rather, they promise that God will be with us in it.
We are pro-choice because we are for women, and men, and children, and families who
struggle to be faithful to God’s will for them in the face of the very real complexities of
their lives. We are pro-choice not because we know that the decisions they make will
always be the right ones, but that we understand that that is something that we never can
know. So we leave the outcome in God’s hands, and in the meantime, we provide the
women who turn to us with every resource at our disposal to help them make and act on
the difficult choices they face. Women making these decisions need to know that they
have our respect, that we honor and celebrate them for making and acting on and living
with complicated ethical decisions. They need to know that we are prayerfully pro-
choice. That’s why I chose Psalm 139.
I also chose the Beatitudes.

Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of
evil against you falsely on my account, for in the same way they persecuted the
prophets who were before you.
Blessed are you when wicked people revile you and persecute you; and rest assured,
they will.
Florence Nightingale was attacked by the public, the medical establishment, the army,
and her family. So was Clara Barton. Margaret Sanger was reviled, not only for providing
birth control, but also for her work with the labor movement at the Lawrence textile
mills, not very far from where we sit right now. And most of us remember the attacks—
verbal and physical—on anyone of any color who worked in the civil rights movement.
The list could go on and on. Those who serve the vulnerable and the oppressed often
become vulnerable and oppressed themselves. Those whose work threatens the power
structures of the world can count on being attacked.
But blessed are you, when wicked folk persecute and revile you. Blessed are you, for you
are not alone. You stand in a long line of prophets and heroes, sung and unsung, who
have changed the world simply by doing what was right, one day at a time. You stand in
a crowd of all the best people. Look around. Where would you rather be?
Maybe in the eyes of your neighbor or in the spaces between us, or a touch, or a tingle in
your spine or a warmth in your heart, somewhere—somewhere—if you are attentive, you
will notice that the Holy One, the One who has promised to be with us whenever we do
difficult or dangerous work, on behalf of those who are in need, the Holy One is with
you, too.
May She bless us all and grant each of us a full measure of faith and courage as we
commit ourselves to this sacred work.
God bless you.

Pro-Prayer, Pro-Family, Pro-Choice
Reverend Julia Mayo Quinlan
Pastor of the Chinese United Methodist Church in New York, Reverend Quinlan addressed a service
commemorating the 23rd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, held by the New York Metro Religious Coalition for
Reproductive Choice on January 22, 1996. Reverend Quinlan is a full Elder of the United Methodist
Church and is ordained as a minister in the American Baptist Church.
I stand here tonight saying unashamedly and unequivocally I am pro-prayer, pro-family

and pro-choice. I have wrestled in the past few weeks with how to communicate this, as I
was invited to, considering that the most vocal, violent group of people opposed to
reproductive choice say they are Christian, too!
While attending a national conference of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
and the Women of Color Partnership in Pensacola, Florida, I experienced for the first
time police escorts with dogs. They were for our protection from the anti-choicers
picketing the conference. I wondered aloud, how do people from the same faith
community have such different understandings of how our faith calls us to live and act on
behalf of justice and mercy?
I went to the hairdresser still wondering. I have had some of the most intimate and
challenging encounters with my Creator under the hairdryer. It seems that when all the
other noise around me is drowned out, I can hear! While praying about what to say
tonight, I heard these questions: Why are you passionately involved in the pro-choice
movement, Julia? What has fueled your passion?
Tonight I hope to encourage the pro-choice activists present and challenge anyone
undecided about where they stand. I would also like to dazzle you with a brilliant
political and social analysis undergirded with theological reflection on the issue of a
woman’s right to choose. However, I have learned to trust my hairdryer encounters. So,
instead of being intellectual, I will be personal and answer the questions I heard by
simply telling my story of how and why I became passionately pro-prayer, pro-family,
pro-choice.
First, let me state what I mean when I say I am passionate. It is my belief that passion
without integrity produces blindness, passion without intimacy with God and each other
produces hardheartedness, and passion without discernment leaves one closed to change,
discovery and active involvement in uncovering the myths that devalue life. Integrity,
intimacy and discernment are integral in my stance as pro-prayer, pro-family and
pro-choice.

My understanding of being pro-prayer evolved in my experience as a hospice chaplain. I
found myself serving a group predominantly other than my own faith and people of an
ethnicity other than my own. Walking with, being with and entering into the struggle that
comes when someone can no longer avoid the reality of their imminent death increased
the frequency of my prayer life and the depth of my prayer encounters.
In this ministry came a discovery: the idea that there is any superior method or pattern of
prayer is a myth. I learned intimacy is of the heart. Prayer is from the depths of one’s own
heart.
In prayer with others, I discovered many truths about the commonness of human
experience. Integrity is found in solidarity with others and in acknowledgement and
celebration of our sojourns by faith. Through my hospice experience, my vision of
community was enlarged. I was able to recover a vision of Shalom often strangulated or
truncated by elevating our own ethnicity, our own particular belief system or our own
culture over another.
Discernment revealed again and again our connectedness as daughters and sons of God,
and the need to remember we witness as we pray. Witnessing through prayer strengthens
us and helps us overcome our fears, our fear of each other—and even our fear of death.
In our sound bite society I stand here with this sound bite that I’d like to hear and see in
the media: Being pro-prayer and pro-choice is not a contradiction!
In the late summer of 1994, my only son was married after a seven-year courtship. About
the fourth year of that courtship my son and his bride-to-be had worked out their
differences and were committed to their relationship. Being loving children, both of them
wanted parental approval. Their parents and their grandparents had taught them to be
non-judgmental, to meet people where they are, not to devalue anyone because of
difference and that God is love. And their parents and their grandparents struggled to
embrace and celebrate their love. Why? Because their families would be racially and
religiously diverse.
My son asked about family values:
What good are family values if they do not embrace with integrity the ability of
love to overcome barriers such as race and religion?
What good are family values if my own backyard is cluttered with the debris of
intolerance and hypocrisy?

What good are family values if they ignore, manipulate, attempt to qualify and lie
about the truth which the psalmists declare: The earth is the Lord’s, and the
fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell therein. (Psalm 24.1)?
Family values: What good are they if our political and societal landscape is
devoid of mercy and justice is aborted?
These haunting questions moved me to seek forgiveness. I know what it means to be

forgiven and to be grace-filled. I know what it means to be more inclusive than I ever
thought could be. I am thankful for God’s mercy and thankful for the opportunity to be a
loving mother and mother-in-law.
In a novel entitled A Case of Need, Michael Crichton tells a story about a botched
abortion which resulted in a homicide. The book’s dialogue is crisp. We hear the accused
doctor talking to his colleague and friend, who tries to clear him of the charges brought
against him. He answers his friend’s questions: Why was he involved in doing abortion
procedures?
“Listen, morality must keep up with technology, because if a person is faced with the
choice of being moral and dead, or immoral and alive, they’ll choose life every time.”
Pro-choice is about choosing life. And it is moral.
As a Black woman who was a young adult in the turbulent 60s, could it be that I am
passionately pro-choice because of my awareness of history?
Black women had no choice.

Black women had no choice when sold into slavery.
Black women had no choice about whom to mate with.
Black women had no choice about who would father their children.
Black women had no choice about the future of those children.
My people’s history calls me to declare: Never again will Black women’s lives be
sacrificed because of a denial of choice!
The word genocide is often lifted up within the Black community when abortion is
discussed. Is a woman’s choosing to have a safe, legal procedure the root cause of
perceived systematic annihilation of the Black race in America? I think not.
• Genocide happens when there is an absence of pre-natal and post-natal care for
poor women.
• Genocide happens when economic justice is aborted.
• Genocide happens when social systems undermine family rather than supporting
families in crisis.

• Genocide happens when foster care systems in urban environments are
overcrowded.
• Genocide happens when prisons are the fastest growth industry in the nation.
• Genocide happens when indifference and classism separate community.
• Genocide happens when the myth “you ain’t got no choice” is perpetrated as
truth!
Perhaps I became passionately pro-choice when I made a decision to have an abortion:

crying, angry, prayerful, thankful for a safe place to go. A colleague of mine sums up my
feelings in a sermon title—”Been There, Done That, Moved On.” I have moved on, but
the experience stays with me and I cannot trivialize the importance of having a safe
medical procedure.
Perhaps I am passionately pro-choice because I held an 11-year-old’s hand as she went

through her third abortion. Her tiny body could not have survived childbirth.
Lastly, perhaps my passion is for “Pat.” Pat came into my family’s life as we tried to love
her into loving herself. She had heard all of her life that she was not wanted, that she was
unlovable. Her mother made sure she knew these “truths” because Pat was the child who
looked like the man who raped her. Pat is gone now. After nineteen years of hearing her
mother, she could not believe otherwise in the three months she lived with us. Never
wanted, never accepted, never understanding her rejection, Pat made her choice—the
drug world she knew. We do not know where she is buried. Neither does her mother.
I would like to end with a reference to Whoopi Goldberg, who spoke about abortion in a
book entitled The Choices We Made. Reading these words, I felt a kinship. She said:
My commitment to choice comes from my belief that you have the right to
decide whether you want to have children or not. The bottom line is that if
someone does not want to have a child they should not be forced into it.
That’s between the woman, her man, if she chooses to make him aware,
and God, whoever God is.
I talk about God because God and I are very close. God gives you choice.
God gives you freedom of choice. That’s in the Bible.
I have this deep belief that God understands whatever dilemma you’re in
and will forgive it. You make a choice that He or She doesn’t think is
right—that’s God’s prerogative.
Unashamedly, unequivocally, I witness that I am pro-prayer, pro-family and pro-choice. I

encourage you all to keep your integrity, move into intimacy with God and each other
and discern the movement of God’s Spirit in freedom and choice.

Explaining Abortion to Children
Reverend Colleen M. McDonald
Minister of Religious Education of the Unitarian Universalist Church in Rockford, Illinois, Reverend
McDonald delivered the following sermon to a group of children on January 18, 1994.
In our church, we can talk about anything at all—even things that are sad or embarrassing
or hard to talk about. For many people, abortion is one of those things that isn’t easy to
talk about, and I’ve had to think very carefully about how I wanted to talk about it with
you today.
Our Unitarian Universalist religion teaches that it is important for us to think for
ourselves. In order to decide what we believe, it is helpful to listen to many different
opinions. Today I’m going to share with you one way of thinking about abortion.
I want to begin by talking about seeds. Living things grow from seeds, right? If you
wanted to grow flowers, what would you need to do? You’d need to plant the seed in a
spot where it could get enough sun and make sure it got enough water; after a time, it
would grow into a plant that made flowers. If you pulled the seed out of the ground while
the plant was still growing, though, you wouldn’t get your flowers. That’s a rather sad
thought.
People, also, grow from seeds, one from a man and one from a woman. The seeds grow
in the mother’s body, inside her womb or uterus; that’s called being pregnant. Sometimes
a baby starts growing in a woman’s body when she doesn’t want to be a mother. Maybe
she is alone and doesn’t have enough friends and family to help her be a good parent.
Maybe she doesn’t have enough money to give a child a nice place to live, plenty of food
and decent clothes and medicine when the child is sick. What can she do?
First of all, whenever we have a problem or an important decision to make, it is a good

idea to talk to people we trust. This woman might talk to the man who would be the
baby’s father, her family, her minister, folks in her church, or people whose job it is to
help people with problems. Perhaps there is someone who could take care of the baby
when the mother has to go to work. Perhaps people have baby clothes, bottles and baby
furniture to give to the mother so she can save her money for food.
After talking and thinking things out, the woman might change her mind and decide she
is able to give a baby what it needs; or maybe she will choose to finish growing the baby
in her body and then let another family adopt her or him. But maybe the woman won’t
decide either of these things.
In our country, we have a law that says a pregnant woman who doesn’t want to be a
mother can go to a doctor and have that doctor take the growing seed out of her body.

That’s called an abortion. Life is very precious, and abortion is a decision that shouldn’t
be made without thinking about it very carefully. For many people, it is a very sad
decision. But it’s also very sad when babies are born to parents who can’t give them the
things and the love that will help them grow up healthy and happy. Being a parent is an
important job, and all babies who come into our world deserve families who will
welcome them and take very good care of them.
That is what I have to say about abortion. You may be wondering what your mom or dad
believes, or you may have other questions. Your families and I hope you will share these
questions with us, as well as any thoughts or feelings you may have about what I have
told you; that sharing will help you decide what you believe.

Words of Hope
Dr. James Armstrong
Dr. James Armstrong is Senior Minister of First Congregational Church, Winter Park, Florida. This
sermon was delivered on March 24, 1993, two weeks after the murder of Dr. David Gunn, the first in a
series of abortion-related murders.
I am against violence. I am pro-life.
I am against harassment, intimidation, threats, stalking, bombs and arson. I am pro-life.
I am against murder. I am pro-life.
I am pro-choice. I am pro-life.
The killer of Dr. David Gunn had a bumper sticker propped up in his car’s rear window.
It read: “God is pro-life.” Of course God is pro-life. God is the source of life. I am
pro-life. You are pro-life. Life is sacred. The phrase “pro-life” doesn’t belong to “them,”
it belongs to all of us.
I am pro-choice. I am pro-life. But when does life, personal life, begin? The early church
debated the question. When is the fetus “ensouled?” it asked. One of the most noted
church fathers (and it always seemed to be the church “fathers” or the lawmaking
“fathers,” not the “mothers,” who were called upon to resolve these issues) insisted that
the male fetus was ensouled after thirty days; the female fetus was ensouled after ninety
days. (Sexism isn’t all that new.) Anthropologists, physicians, philosophers and moral
theologians are not agreed on when personal life begins. It is a matter of metaphysical
speculation.
Meanwhile, the rights of women to control their own bodies are at risk. A woman’s body
does not belong to the government. A woman’s body does not belong to the church. A
woman’s body does not belong to somebody else’s conscience. A woman’s body belongs
to that woman. We live in an imperfect world and abortion is always a sad choice. But a
woman has the right to make that choice within the sacred precincts of her own soul.
There are those, and they form an angry, irrational, violent chorus, who do not agree. On
Wednesday, March 10th, Dr. David Gunn, a 47-year-old physician who performed
abortions, was shot in the back, outside a Pensacola abortion clinic. Michael Griffin, a
religious fanatic given over to “fits of violence,” was left with a smoking, snub-nosed
38-caliber revolver in his hand. Griffin was the killer.
On Christmas Day in 1984, a clinic and two doctors’ offices were bombed in Pensacola.
It was then, according to newspaper accounts, that Pensacola became “the darling of the
anti-abortion movement.” Nine years later that climate of violence spawned murder.

Following his father’s death, David Gunn, Jr., a student at the University of Alabama,
said, “He died for what he believed in.” He said, “People came to (my father) for a legal
service, and he provided it as clean and safe and considerately as he possibly could. He
loved to help people. He sacrificed everything for that.”
We are here today to pay tribute to the memory of Dr. David Gunn, a man of great good
humor and tremendous courage, who was shot down by a cowardly assassin. We are here
to condemn an atmosphere of violent lawlessness that has spread across the land, from
clinic to clinic, from doctor’s office to doctor’s office. We are here to say, “Enough is
enough!”
Last month, the fire-bombing of a clinic in Corpus Christi, Texas, razed the building and
caused $1,000,000 in damages. Enough is enough!
A couple of weeks ago, acid was sprayed into eight clinics in Riverside and San Diego
counties in southern California. Four health care workers were hospitalized. Enough is
enough!
South Dakota has one doctor who performs abortions. He has carried a gun for years.
Now his wife has given him a bullet-proof vest. Enough is enough!
Security officers have had to be employed by clinics in Indiana, Kansas, Missouri and
Iowa. Bullet-proof windows have been installed in Boulder, Colorado. Enough is enough!
In 1990, there were 58 acts of violence recorded against abortion providers; in 1991,
there were 93; in 1992, there were 186. Acts of violence are escalating. Enough is
enough!
Intimidation of doctors’ children, around-the-clock phone threats, arson, acid throwing,

bombing, shotgun blasts, pushing, shoving, obstructing passage ways. Enough is enough!
But the violence has grown out of the rhetoric. Randall Terry, founder of Operation
Rescue, has called the slain Dr. David Gunn “a mass murderer.” Speaking of doctors who
provide abortions he has said, “Humiliate, embarrass, shame and expose them. They are
like human rats.” And Joseph Foreman, a Presbyterian minister who is co-founder of
Missionaries to the Pre-Born, referring to the death of David Gunn, wrote in USA Today,
“What we have in Pensacola is five to ten lives in the womb who were spared by Michael
Griffin’s act.” Michael Griffin’s “act” was cold-blooded murder. Operation Rescue,
Missionaries to the Pre-Born, Rescue America—enough is enough!
But there is more than indignation wrapped up in this moment. This is a service of tribute
and of hope.

What is there to hope for?
We are here, aren’t we? For too long we have been standing on the sidelines—at least
some of us have—while forces of right-wing bigotry have held sway. There are people
gathered together in this room who have never been together before. We are joining
hands to say, “We are committed to the rights of women. We are committed to doctors
and clinics that are meeting the needs of women. We are committed to a rule of law. We
are committed to a non-violent response to acts and voices of madness…and we are
together.” There is hope.
The President of the United States, unlike his two predecessors, has said he will defend
the rights of women to choose. There is hope.
The new Attorney General of the United States, deploring the assassination of Dr. Gunn,
has said the same. There is hope.
Congress is considering two proposals at the present time, a Freedom of Choice Act and a
Freedom of Access to Clinics Act. There is hope.
The Florida House has approved a bill protecting the rights of people to enter and leave
medical facilities without disruptive intimidation. There is hope.
Religious groups and organizations, condemning the arrogance of particular voices that
presume to speak for God, have pled for sanity, nonviolence and dialogue. There is hope.
But more, much more—our spirits are joining together, as one, in settings like this across
our land. We are coming together in the name of justice, in the name of human rights, in
the name of common decency to face down the forces of hatred, bigotry and oppression.
It was Martin Luther King, Jr., who said:
We shall meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will, and we
shall continue to love you…Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and we
shall still love you. Send your perpetrators of violence into our community…and
we shall still love you…Love is the most durable power in the world.
Non-violent love, yes. But we will not cower in the shadows. Enough is enough!

Choice: A Declaration of Faith
Bishop Melvin G. Talbert
Bishop Talbert, bishop of the United Methodist Church in the San Francisco area, delivered this sermon at
the Religious Coalition interfaith convocation during the Democratic convention of 1996. Bishop Talbert
spoke at St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral in San Diego, California on August 12, 1996.
Introduction
As you are aware, abortion is one of the most controversial issues facing people in this
nation and around the world. It touches people at the core of their existence. It causes
them to react, even if their reaction is illogical or irrational. So, to be here with you today,
I am placing myself squarely in the middle of this national debate. But you know, I have
been here before. I was here when I made my commitment to non-violence in 1960. I was
here when I went to jail to protest “Jim Crow” laws which violated the human and civil
rights of people of color. I was here when I made the commitment to appoint pastors to
churches on the basis of their gifts and graces for ministry, rather than on the basis of
their color or gender. So, if I had backed out of this opportunity to be here with you, I
could not have lived with myself. For you see, I believe God calls the people of faith to
be witness in the face of such a volatile, controversial and emotional issue as abortion.
I am here today as a United Methodist bishop who supports the moral stance taken by his
church. But more than that, I am here because I believe people of faith cannot remain
silent when some would make it appear that people of faith are of one mind on this issue.
Therefore, I am here this morning to join with you from many religious and political
persuasions to declare our unequivocal stand for choice. We are here to dispose of the
myth that all people of faith in this nation are against choice. In reality, there are many of
us who believe that choice is the most logical and the most responsible position any
religious institution can take on this issue. I feel obliged to make this assertion because
choice acknowledges that in the final analysis, each individual must decide and act.
Why am I willing to risk this assertion? I am willing to do so because I believe we are

dealing with a matter that is fundamental to our faith. Thus, it is the individual who must
search his/her own soul and act on his/her own conscience. My sisters and brothers, we
are dealing with something that is deeply spiritual and cannot be left to those who would
choose to politicize this issue and further victimize those who must ultimately decide for
themselves.
A Look at Scripture
Who are we as people of faith to concern ourselves with this highly controversial issue of
abortion? The psalmist attempted to answer that question when he said:

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that
you have established; what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them? Yet you have made them a little lower than God
and crowned them with glory and honor. You have given them dominion over the
works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet, all sheep and oxen
and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, the fish of the sea, whatever
passes along the paths of the seas. O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your
name in all the earth! (Psalm 8:3-9 NRSV).
According to the psalmist, we are the ones made a little lower than God. We are the ones
God has given dominion over all the works of creation. Dominion implies power, control,
influence, oversight or stewardship; it implies responsibility. Since this vast creation is
not ours—it is God’s—I believe stewardship or responsibility are more appropriate words
to describe our relationship to God and to all God’s creation. Stewardship means
oversight of something that is not ours, but is ours to use and to preserve as a gift from
God. Responsibility suggests being accountable or answerable to someone for something.
In the whole realm of God’s creation, human beings are to use, preserve and conserve.
Thus, we are responsible and accountable to God for all creation, including ourselves; our
acts and deeds; our actions and decisions. God did not create us as robots. Rather, God
has set us free to be responsible or irresponsible, to be accountable or unaccountable. We
are free to be or not to be in covenant with God. To be faithful is to be in covenant with
God. That is, we commit ourselves to acting, deciding and choosing based on our
understanding of our relationship to God and to all creation. Our commitment is not
based on some politically motivated and conspired emotional appeal that will enact or
codify legislation that could have the effect of limiting or taking away our freedom of
conscience, without recrimination.
As people of faith, we are God’s moral agents for good in this world; we are ambassadors
for justice, freedom and dignity for all creation, especially for the human family and
those within it who have been marginalized and disenfranchised. We are challenged and
inspired to be disciples of such prophets and spiritual leaders as Micah, Jeremiah, Mary
McCloud Bethune, Martin Luther King, Jr. and countless others who have gone before
us, whose moral and spiritual influence inspire us to proclaim, “Let justice roll down like
water, and righteousness like a mighty river.” We are called to follow Jesus who said,
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because God has anointed me to bring good news to
the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the
blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed” (Luke 4: 18-19).
Implications for Contemporary People of Faith

So, we gather here this morning as people of faith. And as people of faith, we boldly take
our stand for choice. We do so because of our faith, and not in spite of it. We gather here
because we believe God calls us to this hour.
On the matter of abortion, the Social Principles of the United Methodist Church states the
following: “The beginning of life and the ending of life are the God-given boundaries of
human existence. While individuals have always had some degree of control over when
they would die, they now have the awesome power to determine when and even whether
new individuals will be born. Our belief in the sanctity of the unborn human life makes
us reluctant to approve abortion. But we are equally bound to respect the sacredness of
the life and well-being of the mother, for whom devastating damage may result from an
unacceptable pregnancy. In continuity with past Christian teaching, we recognize the
tragic conflicts of life with life that may justify abortion, and in such cases support the
legal option of abortion under proper medical procedures. We cannot affirm abortion as
an acceptable means of birth control, and we unconditionally reject it as a means of
gender selection. We call all Christians to a searching and prayerful inquiry into the sorts
of conditions that may warrant abortion. We call for the Church to provide nurturing
ministries to those who give birth. Governmental laws and regulations do not provide all
the guidance required by the informed Christian conscience. Therefore, a decision
concerning abortion should be made only after thoughtful and prayerful consideration by
the parties involved, with medical, pastoral and other appropriate counsel.”
My sisters and brothers, to be for choice is to be willing to enter into the pain and the
struggle of life in the real world, and in the face of that reality, to choose. It is in this
context that we are challenged to face the ambiguity and the complexity of conflicting
values and judgments. To choose abortion is not a rush to judgment. To choose or not to
choose abortion can be the greatest and most difficult decision one can make.
Some pro-life advocates would have the politicians and the media believe that those who
stand for choice will always opt for abortion. My sisters and brothers, my experience tells
me otherwise. To be pro-choice, to stand for choice, is to support those who come down
on either side. Pro-choice advocates refuse to close the door to the expression of free will.
It was William Matthews who said: “God has so framed us to make freedom of choice
and action the very basis of all moral improvement, and all our faculties, mental and
moral, resent and revolt against the idea of coercion.”
In the United Methodist resolution on the “Status of Women,” we find these words:
“Coercion is still common, sometimes aimed at increasing births, sometimes at limiting
them. Evidence now clearly shows that many poor, particularly ethnic, women have been
sterilized without their understanding of what was being done to them without their
informed consent. In many places, safe and legal abortion is denied, in some cases even
to save the life of the pregnant woman.” In our UMC resolution on “Health and
Wholeness,” we find these words: “Religious…counseling should be available to all

parents and families when they are called upon to make difficult medical choices, so that
responsible decisions, within the context of the Christian faith, may be made concerning
organ transplants, use of extreme measures to prolong life, abortion, sterilization, genetic
counseling, institutionalization and death with dignity.” In our UMC resolution on
“Responsible Parenthood,” we say: “We reject the simplistic answers to the problem of
abortion which, on the one hand, regard all abortions as murders, or, on the other hand,
regard abortions as medical procedures without moral significance.” In our resolution on
“Opposition To A Call For A Constitutional Convention,” we declare:
‘Right to Life’ advocates, frustrated by their inability to succeed in their

goals of eliminating all abortions through the normal legislative process,
are now trying the constitutional convention route. Yet, such an
amendment, declaring the fetus a person from the moment of conception,
would be, in effect, to write one theological position into the Constitution.
Various faith groups, including The United Methodist Church, do not
share that theology. Such a position would be tantamount to declaring that
an abortion for any reason is murder. It could also inhibit the use of
contraceptives such as the intrauterine device (IUD). This would be
contrary to the doctrine of separation of church and state embodied in the
Constitution and would impinge on freedom of religion, guaranteed in the
First Amendment.
Need I say more? My sisters and brothers, I am here to join with you in giving a
resounding “yes” to “Pro-Choice,” and a resounding “no” to those who would dare to
prevent the option of choice to all.
Conclusion
My sisters and brothers, the public stance of the Christian Coalition in both national
political conventions is a mockery of justice and a defamation of the character and
integrity of the religious community as a whole in the nation. For too long, politicians,
mostly men, have denied the civil and human rights of women. For too long, the Church
has either condoned, or remained silent, while women and oppressed minorities have
sought justice and freedom from oppression. Now is the time for people of faith in this
nation to stand up and be counted in a way that can make a difference.
Sisters and brothers of faith, the time is at hand when we are called to make our
declaration of faith. Now is the time for us to stand for the option of choice for women,
no matter what. Now is the time for us to remember who women are—God’s sacred
persons who are capable of deciding for themselves what is best. Now is the time for us
as the faith community to declare to women, “We will be there with you in the morning,”
no matter what choice you make in the context of your faith.

It is my humble opinion that “Pro-Choice” is the only viable option the faith community
can support. Our faith compels us to respect others’ values, life circumstances and
decisions. May we let our voices be heard, this week in San Diego and later this month in
Chicago, as we respond to those who would dare to use coercion to codify their
theological positions in the laws of this nation. Say “No!” to coercion and “Yes!” to “Pro-
Choice!” I believe that is the only choice before us. Amen!

The “Truth” About Abortion
Rabbi Mark Dov Shapiro
Rabbi Shapiro delivered this sermon at a vigil held by the Western Massachusetts Religious Coalition for
Reproductive Choice on the 25th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade on January 22, 1998. Rabbi Shapiro is rabbi
of Temple Sinai in Springfield, Massachusetts.
I want to begin this evening by sharing the opening lines of an autobiographical piece
written by a 90-year-old Jewish woman. The story comes from a presentation made by
my colleague, Rabbi Lynne Landsberg. The story opens in Antwerp at the end of the last
century.
I remember very little about my mother. I wish I could remember sitting

on my mother’s lap. Did she ever put her arms around my sister and me?
No matter how hard I try, all I remember is somebody jumping off the
table. She wore a long, black skirt and a blouse with a high collar. I
remember watching my mother jump off the table and I was fascinated.
Later on in life I wondered: Why did she jump off the table so vigorously?
When I told this story to a friend who had lived in Europe, she said, “Oh,
my mother jumped off the table too. She jumped and jumped. They did
not want to be pregnant again.”
One day, there was a commotion. People were coming and going, and then
my mother was sent to the hospital. I never saw her again. She had a baby
and died. We never saw the baby.
That is the kind of story that rings true for those of us here tonight. If this were January
1973 or 1972, odds are we would know someone just like the mother in this story.
Perhaps some of the women here would have experienced her experience on a personal
basis.
Thank God, however, it is not 1972, and for 25 years those of us who are women or love
women have had an alternative to jumping off the table. Abortion is legal in this country
and that is a blessing we celebrate this evening.
For 25 years Roe v. Wade has been the law of the land, and it must remain the
fundamental principle by which we Americans confront the challenge of abortion—or as
The New Republic magazine once called it, “The Abortion Perplex.”
For as committed as I am to maintaining the legality and availability of abortion in

America, I also know that abortion is not so simple.

I like the way Rosemary Ruether put the matter in a prayer for choice later published by
the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice:
God of our mothers and fathers, source of all life and new life, we are
saddened by the conflicts we often experience; conflicts between life and
life, between the affirmation of potential new life and the ongoing life that
we have committed to nurture and strengthen, our own life and the lives of
those we uphold and sustain.
We are more than sad, we are also angry that we are faced with such
choices, for these are choices in which there is no wholly good way; these
are choices against a potential life or against existing life.
We do not like to have to make these choices. We would like to neatly

arrange our lives so we do not have to make these choices, but that is not
always possible.
That is “the abortion perplex.”
It is the realization and the admission that no one is happy about abortion.
As the prayer boldly says, sometimes there are no good choices. Though we would like to
arrange our lives neatly, though we wish that difficult choices did not come our way, that
is not always possible.
And that is why we know that no one—least of all the individual women who make the
choice to discontinue a pregnancy—gladly or glibly or easily advocates for the legal right
to abortion. Those who act within the parameters of American law and seek an abortion
do so because they must. But they always act with a heavy heart for the choices they
make are the toughest choices any human being can make. Not choices between one
vacation spot and another. Not choices between one color car and another. But rather
saddening, maddening choices between a potential life and an existing life.
Within my own tradition, Judaism, the decision for choice is also nuanced and difficult.
That is not to say that the major liberal organizations of American Jewry are not for
choice. All of them are. At the same time, just listen to some of the statements from the
rabbinic organizations, for example.
From the Reform rabbinate (taken from a 1975 statement): “We affirm the legal right of a
family or a woman to determine…whether or not to terminate a particular
pregnancy…We believe that in any decision whether or not to terminate a pregnancy, the
individual family or woman must weigh the tradition as they struggle to formulate their
own religious and moral criteria to reach their own personal decision.”

From the Conservative rabbinate (taken from a 1983 statement): “Jewish tradition is
sensitive to the sanctity of life, and does not permit abortion on demand. However, it
sanctions abortion under some circumstances because it does not regard the fetus as an
autonomous person…The fetus is a life in the process of development, and the decision
to abort it should never be taken lightly…There are many grave legal and moral issues
involved.”
“We affirm the legal right…Judaism sanctions abortion.” There you have the position for
choice enunciated.
On the other hand, listen to the larger context. “The individual family or women must
weigh the tradition as they struggle…to reach a…decision…There are many grave legal
and moral issues involved.”
Honest people, serious people, men and women who support Roe v. Wade, never do so
lightly. They struggle. They tread softly because there are lives at stake here and because
they know that all life is ultimately sacred.
All of which isn’t to suggest in any way that I propose backing away from the
hard-earned right to make such decisions freely and legally.
Far from it.
The right to decide about abortion must remain the personal decision of each family or
woman.
Why then rehearse the difficulties of the decision? Because I am trying to imagine what I
might say to one of those people who patrol the sidewalks outside abortion clinics around
the country. You know, the ones with their placards against choice, the ones who know
what is right, what is virtue and what is sin.
If I were to address such a person tonight, I think I might say this.
I might say: Friend, just for a minute put down your placard and think twice. Think about
your slogans and your insistence that you are right while I am wrong, you are saving
children while I am killing them.
Look me in the eye and tell me that you stand for virtue while I stand for sin. One-on-one
that is not so easy to do. For if you stop chanting your slogans, take me seriously, and
listen to me, you’ll hear me speak as one human being to another. You’ll hear me admit
that I do not claim to know the truth about life. More than that, I do not presume to tell
you what truth is.

What I do, instead, is admit that this is an imperfect, finite world where many people may
have access to many sides of the many-sided truth about life.
You see, I believe that truth is too important for any one person to have it all. And that
means that, although I am convinced life does not begin at conception and I learn that
from my reading of the Bible, I won’t make you read the Bible as I do and I won’t make
you believe what I do. You can read it your way with all the passion you have as long as
you respect my interpretation and my passion.
What is called for really is some humility, the honest recognition that as certain as you
are of God’s will, you can never know for sure if you’ve got it right or if I’ve got it right.
Do you want to hear a fascinating teaching out of the Jewish past? It comes from the
rabbis who lived in the second century or so. These great scholars who knew their Bible
virtually by memory were thinking about what happened at Mount Sinai when the
commandments were given. Now if ever there was a time when God’s “truth” should
have been crystal clear, Sinai has to have been that time. The Bible says, “God spoke
these words,” and then records the words in the Book of Exodus.
So what did the rabbis teach? They said that when the Voice of God came forth at Mount
Sinai, it was like a hammer hitting a rock. When the hammer hits, sparks fly. Every one
of them is the result of the hammer’s impact upon the rock. That is something that makes
them alike. But every one of the sparks is still different.
So it is, the rabbis taught, that every verse of Scripture throws off its own sparks. Not one
spark but many sparks, which is to say, not one meaning but many meanings. No one
interpretation of any text is automatically the correct interpretation—not mine alone
(which favors choice) and not yours either (which forbids choice). But if I understand the
rabbis’ teaching—both (even if they are contrary) have a claim to being God’s intent.
And lest you think you can still claim to know exactly what God wants us to do with an
unborn fetus, remember God’s response to Moses at the Burning Bush. When Moses, the
great biblical teacher, wanted to know God’s name, God simply replied, “I am what I
am.” Which was God’s way of saying, “Moses, you cannot have my name. You cannot
pin me down. You cannot ever totally grasp my being. There will always be uncertainty,
always be a mystery.”
So, my friend with the placard condemning Roe v. Wade, let me ask you again to stop and
listen to me. I don’t claim to know what is good for you. I don’t claim to know God’s
will when it comes to your life.
But this much I do know. God is subtle. God is far more difficult to pin down than you
wish. The truth about life and abortion and love is also subtler than you imagine.

I know you mean well.
Think the same of me.
I know you believe in your cause.
Think the same of me.
I know you want the truth to be as unequivocal as the light of day. I know you want God
to render an absolute judgment.
But that may simply not be possible.
As I said before, truth is just too important for any one person to have it all.
In this imperfect world, then, be humble.
As the sparks fly by, take my word for it.
All of us are doing our best to live honestly. When we stand for reproductive freedom, we
are therefore not trying to trick you or do what we know is wrong.
No, we are always doing our best. We are doing our best to honor life amidst a world of
sometimes joyous, sometimes difficult choices.

Hospital Mergers Restrict Services (Jewish Tradition)
Rabbi Bonnie Margulis
Rabbi Margulis is director of clergy programs for the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice and has
managed the Religious Coalition’s hospital mergers project.
Imagine you are a woman whose medical condition would make pregnancy potentially
life-threatening. Yet your health care provider will not even discuss contraception or
sterilization with you, much less provide these services.
Imagine that you have just been raped. Among your many fears is the fear of pregnancy.
Yet the hospital emergency room won’t provide you with emergency contraception.
Imagine you are facing a crisis pregnancy, yet the only hospital in your area won’t
perform any abortions, at any point in pregnancy, for any reason.
Imagine that you wake up tomorrow to find all reproductive health care has ceased to
exist in your community.
Sound improbable? It is happening today, in community after community across the

country, as secular hospitals merge with religious hospitals and are forced to take on
particular religious restrictions to health care.
We in the Jewish community need to be involved in this issue. One of the most important
reciprocal responsibilities we have in Judaism is to provide proper medical care for each
other. We Jews have a long tradition of involvement in the healing arts. From Talmudic
times onward, medicine and religion were closely interwoven. Our ancestors believed
that healing rested ultimately with God, but that physicians were God’s instruments on
earth, God’s partners, if you will, in the ongoing work of maintaining life. Because of
this, Jews from antiquity onward were noted for their medical knowledge and skills as
healers. Many rabbis were also doctors, seeing it as a spiritual profession on a par with
the rabbinate. Throughout the Middle Ages, Jewish doctors attained positions of
prominence even in the Gentile world, even becoming court physicians.
Jewish communities were responsible for the care of their own sick, and so Jewish
communal hospitals were the norm wherever there were Jews. In the United States in
modern times, Jewish hospitals were created because Jews felt a need for hospitals with a
Jewish atmosphere, that understood the needs of the Jewish patients. As this need
diminished, there still was a need for Jewish hospitals because of discrimination against
Jewish doctors in attaining positions at other hospitals.
Yet Jewish doctors and hospitals did not discriminate against others, treating all, Jew and
Gentile, alike. And while Jewish hospitals were set up to provide a Jewish atmosphere,

never was Jewish law regarding health care imposed upon doctors in their practice or
patients in their receipt of health care.
In fact, every religion has placed a great value on healing, and each tradition has
perpetuated a heritage of service to the sick and ill in society. And in today’s world, the
tradition of healing has blossomed into a network of sectarian and non-sectarian hospitals
that provide care to those that need it.
It is sadly evident that this tradition of healing has suffered in the past decade due to the
economics of medical care. Costs have escalated, the quality of care has diminished and
many of us are not as confident as we may have been in the past that our society can
provide suitable medical care to those who need it.
One recent phenomenon of this downward trend in medical care has been the merger of
hospitals in small and medium size communities. By itself, the merger of medical
facilities may make a lot of economic sense. But when one of the institutions merging is
religiously sponsored, and narrow religious doctrines and dogma govern its medical
policies concerning beginning-of-life issues and also end-of-life issues, it is time to pay
attention. Community-based hospitals are merging with or are being taken over by
religiously based organizations that dictate care regimens based upon what sometimes are
narrow religious philosophies. When this happens, there is a loss of service to people who
need those services. People lose control over their own health care.
According to Family Planning Advocates of New York State, Baptist and Adventist
hospitals restrict certain health services. But with these groups, there seems to be
significant local autonomy when it comes to making decisions of this kind.
The most significant religious influence on American health care delivery comes from the
Roman Catholic health care systems. Catholic hospitals provide 15 percent of all hospital
care, about 600 hospitals nationwide. According to Modern Healthcare magazine, this
represents the nation’s largest not-for-profit provider of health care. And all of these
hospitals have care policies governed by a single overriding philosophy, laid out in what
is known as “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services,” which
severely limits health care. Under these directives, hospitals are forbidden to provide
fertility treatments, contraception of any kind, sterilizations and abortions. In addition,
the directives instruct Catholic hospitals not to honor advance medical directives, or
living wills, if what is requested in them is “contrary to Catholic teaching.” The directives
state that, in cases where medicine cannot alleviate a patient’s suffering, the patient
“should be helped to appreciate the Christian understanding of redemptive suffering.”
As long as there are both religiously affiliated hospitals and secular hospitals in a
community, patients of all faiths, and those who are non-religious, can continue to have a
choice about the health care services they want. But when a provider with restrictive

religious rules dominates most or all health care services in one market, patients are in
danger of losing their access to a full range of health services. And this is regardless of
the religious affiliations of the people in the community. Today, there are 76 Catholic
sole provider hospitals (a hospital in a community with no other hospitals within a
reasonable distance) in 26 states. In many of these communities, Catholics make up less
than one percent of the population, yet the “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic
Health Care Services” deny access to reproductive health care to everyone. And the sad
part is that this loss occurs without people even realizing it has happened.
Hospital mergers tend to take place behind closed doors, out of the public view. But
when they do become public knowledge and the potential results of a proposed merger
become known, public outcry against the loss of services can have a profound impact.
From Poughkeepsie, New York, to Battle Creek, Michigan, community involvement has
either put a halt to a proposed merger or has forced the merging hospitals to come up
with creative solutions to preserve the health care services the community relies upon.
For instance, in Battle Creek, the secular hospital ended up setting up a completely
separate entity on its top floor, a sort of hospital within a hospital, with one operating
room and four beds. This “condominium hospital” had its own board, its own staff, its
own budget, and so it could continue to offer reproductive health care. In Poughkeepsie,
public outcry to a proposed merger led the two hospitals to give up the merger idea.
Instead, they agreed to collaborate, and so, since they no longer compete and waste
resources offering duplicative services, they are both in a sound financial position.
The lesson to be drawn from these two cases is clear: If a merger is going to occur, we
must find out what the results of that merger would be, and if they are unacceptable, we
must make our protests heard. Community activism is key to protecting our rights not to
have someone else’s religious values imposed on our health care.
The great rabbi-physician Maimonides wrote in his Mishneh Torah that it is permissible
for people to seek out doctors, rather than simply trusting to God’s healing powers,
because God is the one who gave us the sekhel—the understanding—to figure out how to
treat disease. And so it would be a waste of God’s gift not to use it as best we can. So too
must we use our sekhel to preserve our access to health care. We must take the
responsibility to learn about what services our hospitals currently provide and what they
don’t. We must take the responsibility to learn about the financial health of our medical
facilities, to be aware of the potential for a merger. We should cultivate relationships with
hospital board members, some of whom may be members of our own community, who
would be our allies in the event of a proposed merger.
What’s wrong about sectarian hospitals and their mergers with community care facilities
is that they base their care upon their distinctive religious philosophies, not the needs of
the people of their communities. In his oath for physicians, Maimonides made this
assertion: “May I never see in the patient anything else but a fellow creature in pain.”

Above all else, it is the responsibility of the health care profession to relieve the patient’s
pain and suffering. This should be the overriding concern, and this concern should lead
the health care providers to do whatever is medically necessary, regardless of the
religious beliefs of the sponsoring institution.
May we ever remain loyal to our core Jewish values of healing. And may we be able to
provide this healing for all.
Shabbat Shalom.

Creating a “Zone of Respect” in Hospital Mergers (Christian Tradition)
Texts: Leviticus 19:33-34; Galatians 3:23-29; John 4:7-30
Reverend Applegate, a Presbyterian minister, is a former director of Concerned Clergy for Choice of
Family Planning Advocates of New York State.
When I was younger, my family moved several times. I got to be the “new kid” in school
more than once, which meant I had to endure a certain amount of testing at the hands of
the kids who were already there. Because I was different, I had to be tested. If I could
handle the testing, I was “in.” I was officially a part of the class. If I couldn’t handle it, it
would be a very long school year.
I can laugh about it now, but it all seemed very serious when I was eight years old. I am
grateful to have grown out of that awkward stage of having to “fit in” and having to
endure all kinds of strange behaviors to prove myself before being accepted by others.
As I look around at our world today, however, I realize that awkward stage is, in fact, not
over. “New kids” on the block still face hazing and testing before they are accepted into
the neighborhood. It may be subtler and less overt, but it’s still there. Every time a new
family moves to the block, we watch them carefully for signs that they will “fit in” here.
We watch their comings and goings, we note if they go to church or not—and if so,
which one—we see where they do their marketing, we track where their clothes are from.
We watch how they care for the lawn and whether or not they use the recycling bin
properly.
It happens every time a new person takes over the desk next to yours at work. What kind
of pictures does she put on the shelf? Does she respect how we do things around here, or
is she always talking about how they did it where she worked before? Does he follow our
routine, or does he insist on following his own? It’s OK, we’ll send some subtle signals to
let him know how to get along here, how to fit in, how to do things our way.
We discover, in fact, we haven’t grown out of that stage at all; we’ve simply taken it to a
different level and are more sophisticated about it. For the most part, of course, this
behavior is harmless. It is how we create a social contract that enables us to live together
in some kind of harmony. It can be a fairly efficient way of sharing the “house rules”
with a newcomer, and can help us establish new rules as we need them.
But this behavior, this testing of the newcomer or the stranger, is not always so benign.
Sometimes it becomes not just a sharing of the rules, but an enforcement or imposition of
them upon another. Sometimes it forces another person to become more like us or face
the consequences. When I was eight, that usually meant the class bully “teaching me a

lesson.” When I broke or neglected a rule, I would be “straightened out” fairly quickly
and in a way that would ensure it wouldn’t happen again.
As grown-ups, we’d like to say we’ve outgrown that kind of behavior, but if we’re honest
we have to admit it isn’t true. Even today, more than we’d like to admit, for example,
when people of color move into a neighborhood that has been traditionally Caucasian,
teaching them “the rules” often means violence. Perhaps even worse. We don’t limit
ourselves to just strangers or newcomers. We also seek to impose our rules on anyone
who is different, anyone who believes differently than we do, anyone who falls outside of
our “norm.”
Afraid of someone who challenges our rules, someone who questions them, someone
who by their very presence calls our rules into question, we have a variety of ways to
teach them the rules. We can use silence to isolate this “other” until he or she “comes
around.” We can share comments that leave no doubt as to “proper” behavior. We can
redo something the person has done, making sure that he or she sees it being done the
“right way.” We can, in short, enforce and impose our rules quite effectively without
resorting to physical violence.
This entire behavior contrasts interestingly with the texts we have heard today. Each of
them speaks about the stranger in our midst, the sojourner, and the newcomer—those
who are different from us. But none of them says anything about teaching the sojourner
our rules. In fact, they lean the other way, indicating that we need to operate out of
respect for the sojourner, respecting his or her own tradition. We may share our own
tradition, but we are not given the green light to impose it on another without his or her
permission.
Leviticus counsels loving the sojourner as oneself, recognizing that we have all been in
the place of the sojourner at one time or another. We are to do him or her no wrong,
treating him or her as one of us. This injunction is repeated often; the surplus from the
harvest is not to be taken from the field but is to be left for the “sojourner, the widow and
the fatherless” (Deut. 24:19-22). Again and again, the people of God are called to have
respect for the sojourner and to provide hospitality. The sojourner may be invited to share
in celebrations and times of worship, but it is clear that it is to be an invitation, not an
ultimatum.
In writing to the Galatians, Paul stresses that having been baptized into Christ, we now
live in a state of grace; we no longer live under the law, nor are we bound by human
distinctions that create divisions among us. “There is no longer Jew nor Greek, free nor
slave, male nor female—we are all one.” And there is, by extension, no longer newcomer
and old-timer, either. The newcomer shares in status with those who have been here a
while; the sojourner does not have second-class status, but is, by definition, a part of the
family. The differences we seek to enforce no longer matter.

In the story of the woman at the well, Jesus himself is the sojourner. Travelling across
Samaria, he encounters people who have followed a different faith tradition. Rather than
treating him poorly, however, the woman extends hospitality to him. She respects his
tradition and allows him to tell her about it. She does not impose her belief upon him, but
creates space for him. In approaching each other with mutual respect and hospitality,
Jesus and the woman discover how they can create a new community together.
In each of the texts, the call to people of faith is to make space for the sojourner, to create
a “zone of respect” for the stranger in our midst. The stranger is not “fair game” for
whatever we want to impose; he or she is to be respected and treated as a friend.
Hospitality is to be extended, a hospitality that welcomes and puts him or her at ease. We
are to treat him or her as we would ourselves expect to be treated if we were the stranger
or the sojourner. And, as Leviticus clearly reminds us, we all will be a stranger or a
sojourner at one time or another.
It is not easy to go against our human nature that wants to enforce and impose our rules
on others. We like to have things our way. We want others to agree with us, thereby
validating our beliefs. We want others to affirm that our way is the best way. We want
others to admit we’re better/stronger/faster/smarter than they are. We want our way to be
the way. We want everyone—the stranger, the sojourner, our neighbor—to become,
behave and believe just like us. Rather than treating him or her with respect, we treat
these others as a convert to be won, a conquest to be captured. They are no longer human
beings, but objects to be won.
Recently, across our nation, we have seen a clear manifestation of this tendency. Due to
the massive changes facing healthcare, many hospitals are merging with one another in
order to lower costs and increase efficiency. Some estimates claim that over the past three
years, 40 percent of hospitals in our country have entered into or completed such
mergers. They are happening everywhere.
What lifts that bit of news off the business page and brings it into our service today is that
many of these mergers are taking place between community hospitals and religious
hospitals. In these cases, more and more often, the religious hospitals are demanding that
the community hospital follow their rules and regulations—rules and regulations that
often bar certain procedures, services and treatments. It doesn’t matter that the
community hospital has provided them for a hundred years; it doesn’t matter that people
in the community want and have come to rely upon them; it doesn’t matter that not
everyone in the community is of the same faith tradition; it doesn’t matter that not
everyone in town agrees with the rules. What matters is that the religious hospital will
impose and enforce its rules.

What, you may ask, about those who disagree with those rules, the others in the
community who are not a part of that faith tradition? Do we simply impose the rules upon
them? Do we enforce the rules with all of the ways we have at our disposal? Do we
decide what is best for others—even though what we think is best may go against their
beliefs and values?
These mergers raise difficult questions for us as people of faith. We certainly want to see
religious healthcare continue; it has a long and meaningful history in our nation. But we
have been called to create space for those who are different from us; we have been called
to treat them as we would wish to be treated; we have been called to share hospitality
with them. It would seem that restricting healthcare does not fulfill this calling. Indeed,
restricting access for others just because we don’t like it cuts awfully close to Doug
Sanders inviting me in fifth grade to meet him across the street after school so he could
teach me about a rule that I had violated.
Creating a zone of respect means more than just paying lip service to the idea of respect
for others. It means making room for them, even when that room is sometimes
inconvenient. Community hospitals have long made that room, treating all people and
offering all services; oddly enough, they have been more religious in some ways than we
who claim to be people of faith. Be that as it may, we can help them continue to be zones
of respect in our community by working to ensure that they are not encumbered with
rules that restrict what they may offer and whom they may treat. We can practice our
hospitality by being sure that there is place for those who disagree with us. We can
practice by creating a place where others are welcomed as warmly as we ourselves would
hope to be welcomed. We can practice by creating space for all of God’s children where
they will be given treatment as we ourselves might hope to be given treatment.
You can take it from me; I learned that being different is hard. But the good news is it
doesn’t have to be. Let us heed the call to be new creations by turning away from our
need to impose our rules on others, and to turn to the task of creating mutual respect and
care.
May God guide us on that journey. Amen.

Interfaith Services

Faithful Witness for Choice!
Guidelines for a Religious Convocation
Developed by the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice.
In preparing for a religious convocation at the local level, there are a few points to
remember.
1. Because of the complexity of the event, starting early is imperative. In addition to the
challenge of planning, building interest in the community with one or more
pre-convocation events (i.e., showing a Dorothy Fadiman film) requires a lot of lead
time.
2. Diversity is essential. We have had more success with diversity (both racial and
gender) among program participants than among audience participants, but both are
very important. This too takes time, as many bases need to be touched in the
community. Diverse organizations must be brought in at the earliest stage of the
planning process so that they will be invested in its outcome, not just for
crowd-building.
3. Funds must be raised in advance to cover certain immediate costs, such as printing,
telephone, airfare and rentals. Given the broad appeal of a religious event, local
individual donors should be approached for contributions before cash-strapped
organizations.
There are five distinct components of the religious convocation, each of which can be
adapted to suit the needs of the local community.
Arrangements
This is a checklist of things not to forget when planning a religious convocation.
• invitations and/or flyers

• church, synagogue (must be accessible to those who are disabled)
• separate room (VIP) for participating clergy
• parking
• flowers
• banners, visuals
• audio equipment
• security, ushers
• program
• signer, foreign language interpreter (if necessary)
• videographer

• reception/refreshments
• resource (literature) table
Service
First, there should be a clergy leader with extensive political and community contacts.
Participation by a diverse group of religious leaders is essential to show the broad support
for choice in the religious community. Political leaders who are religiously identified
may be appropriately included in the service.
A liturgy committee should be convened early to plan the service and enlist participants.
Some people will want to write their own parts, but these must be approved by the
committee so that the overall message is consistent. The Religious Coalition has
extensive files of liturgy used in previous events, but local groups should be encouraged
to make their own contribution.
The processional should include dignitaries as well as religious leaders, whether or not
they are participating in the service. The processional is the first public opportunity to
show the breadth of support for choice, and should, within reasonable time limits, take
advantage of the grandeur of the event. VIPs should also be recognized from the pulpit by
the leader of the service.
Brief musical selections, poetry, dramatic readings and liturgical dance can also be
effective additions to the religious convocation, particularly as they can be a clear
expression of multiculturalism.
The sermon or keynote address should be delivered by an inspiring speaker known in the
community. In view of the fact that the service tends to convey clipped messages of so
many diverse faiths and individuals, the sermon is the one lengthy portion which ties the
themes together. Also, a “name” speaker will draw a bigger crowd.
The service should also include a formal recessional.
Crowd-Building
Start with the local Religious Coalition affiliate, and then contact the Planned Parenthood
Clergy Committee representative. If you are unable to make contact with either the
affiliate or Planned Parenthood, contact the national office of the Religious Coalition for
help in identifying groups which can help you publicize the event. Above all, it is
important to have a group from the religious community take the lead in organizing the
event. Invitations should go out early to local dignitaries, politicians and community
leaders. Think broadly, because this kind of event should attract more than just the usual
pro-choice leaders. Follow-up calls and personal contacts should be made to ensure
attendance.

Outreach to the general public should be as broad as possible, including women’s,
pro-choice, gay rights, civil rights, and religious youth groups, colleges and universities,
organizations fighting the religious right, anti-censorship organizations and local
affiliates of national religious organizations (i.e., NCJW, UCC, UUA, Hadassah). There
should be a local telephone number with at least a voice mail system to give out basic
information and take messages.
Religiously identified supporters should be encouraged to use their networks to push their
congregations, lay leaders and clergy to be actively involved.
Media Coverage
This process should begin with a press release or media advisory to all local media,
specifically a religion editor (if there is one). Media interest in the event will inevitably
depend on a variety of factors. If there is a “hot” abortion-related issue, such as a clinic
under siege or some controversial legislation pending, there will be more press.
Aggressive follow-up should be done, preferably by the religious leaders themselves, in
order to take advantage of their relationships with local media people.
Timing a religious convocation in a city during a major anti-choice event (for example,
Operation Rescue) would be ideal, but the lead time may not be sufficient. It’s probably
preferable to have a later event than to be unsuccessful during an anti-choice event. On
the other hand, anti-choice presence may generate enough enthusiasm among the
pro-choice community to make the tight timeframe work. The sponsoring local
organization will have to make the determination.
There should be advertisements in the local print press, including religious outlets.
Symbols signifying wheelchair access and sign language interpreter should also appear in
the ad.
A press conference or briefing on the day of the convocation should be considered, but its
prospects for success depend on several factors. First, featuring speakers not normally
associated with the choice issue would attract more notice than the “usual suspects.”
Second, featuring high profile politicians often draws media attention. Third, and most
importantly, attendance and coverage will be determined according to what else is going
on that day.
An alternative “visibility event” might be worth considering in lieu of a press conference.

Members of the clergy (and political leaders) appearing in front of a clinic to “bless” the
work they do can show a powerful symbol of support for reproductive choice. It also has
the secondary benefit of involving and showcasing providers and encouraging them to
speak out as religious people, where appropriate.

Selected, media-savvy religious leaders should be made available for interviews and
feature stories in the days leading up to and on the day of the event. They should be
briefed by media and political experts beforehand. In addition to contemporary figures,
clergy from the pre-Roe v. Wade Clergy Consultation Service are of historical interest.
Other personal stories are also worth ferreting out and pitching to the media.
Media coverage of the convocation itself must be sensitive to the constraints of a diverse
religious event. Ground rules for the location and nature of equipment and personnel
must be communicated in advance and strictly enforced.
Political/Lobbying Component
The willingness of political figures to participate in this event is clearly dependent upon
their having a visible role. Several possibilities have been alluded to previously:
participation in a press conference or other media event; inclusion in the processional and
recessional and being recognized during the service; and a speaking role in the service
itself, though the appropriateness of this must be decided by the liturgy committee.
In state capitals or localities where choice has been a political issue, members of the
clergy should be encouraged to participate in lobbying activities as well as the worship
service. This is particularly important when a relevant legislative matter is pending, but
the general pro-choice religious message is worth conveying regardless of the timing.
Both events featuring political leaders and events aimed at political leaders should be
viewed as incremental steps in a longer process of alliance-building. Not too much should
be expected of any one event in the process.
Finally, it cannot be stressed enough that this general plan can and should be adapted to
the circumstances and political and religious climate of the locality involved. No one
model is universal. The powerful atmosphere of a religious convocation for choice has
been remarked upon by numerous participants, regardless of their level of religious
commitment. In a period when reproductive rights activists find themselves on the
defensive, the convocation presents an excellent opportunity to deliver an affirmative
message to an expanded audience and to solidify the involvement of the clergy in an
ongoing movement. Extensive organizing is required, but it is hoped that this guideline
will provide some helpful direction.

Sample Liturgical Materials for Interfaith Worship Services
The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice is pleased to provide these liturgical
materials for use during interfaith, pro-choice worship. When using these materials,
please cite the authors where noted.
Responsive Readings and Prayers
A Litany of Rejoicing
Leader: Rejoice! For you are called to freedom. You are called to worship and to
adore your God, each in your own way and of your own time.
All: We rejoice in the freedom of our faith—though we are many, yet we are one.
Leader: Rejoice! For you are called to love and life, to revere the exalted quality of
every human life which transcends mere existence.
All: We rejoice in the freedom to love and to sanctify life—though we cherish all life,
we would not diminish its quality in others.
Leader: For you are called to decision, to face the difficult moral and religious demands
of your age and land.
United in Choice
Leader: We pray for women who know that life is beginning within them, who face
the agony of wondering what to do about it when they cannot cope.
All: Give us the strength to meet what we must face.
Leader: We pray for doctors and nurses who daily hold the powers of life and death in
their hands, who are caught in the ethical dilemmas of modern medicine.
All: Enable our compassionate caring for human life at every stage.
Leader: We pray for parents and loved ones of those facing unwanted pregnancies. Lead
them to wise counsel and firm support.
All: Help us give one another loving support.

Leader: We pray for legislators, seeking to be responsive to their people, straining to
hear the voices of the weak, and pressed by strident clamor from any side.
All: We beseech you to hear us, Loving God, and to help us hear you.
Leader: We pray for ministers, rabbis and counselors, helping persons think through the
consequences of their lives, leading them to deeper resources within and beyond.
All: Help us listen to one another with openness and love.
Leader: We pray for the poor, unable to know the freedom so many enjoy, because of
their bondage to poverty.
All: Help us to pursue impatiently a just and equitable society.
A Litany of Divine Love
Leader: We gather in the spirit of the Holy One who loves us without limit, on whose
palms our names are engraved, whose commitment to our well-being is never ending.
All: We gather in the name of the Holy One,

Known by many names,
I am who I am
Forgiving love
Source of light
Unending mystery
Shelter for the homeless
Refuge for the lonely
Liberator of the oppressed
Lover of all peoples.
Leader: We gather with gratitude and awe for divine love that waits for us like a father
waits for the return of a prodigal child.
All: We gather with gratitude and awe for divine love that holds and cradles us like a
mother holds and cradles a nursing child.
Leader: We gather remembering that we are created in the divine image, male and
female we are created to embody God’s Spirit in this world.

As People of God We Seek Justice
Reverend Roselyn Smith-Withers
Reverend Smith-Withers has been active with the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice for more
than 10 years, formerly as a Board member and currently as a member of the Women of Color Partnership
and consultant to the MultiCultural Programs Department. She is associate pastor of Nineteenth Street
Baptist Church in Washington, DC.
Leader: Today, we pray together in the presence of one another and the people of God.
We remember the words of the prophets and the great teachers. We call upon the spirits
of our ancestors and ask for the blessings of the First One, Creator of us all.
All: As people of God, we seek justice.
Leader: We pray together, not because we must but because we may. We pray together
because our commonalities are greater than our differences and because in our
togetherness, our differences are honored and God’s vastness is praised.
All: As people of God we seek justice.
Leader: We stand together, recognizing the risks of solidarity, affirming the power of
our presence and celebrating the pro-choice legacy of courage and commitment: justice
and peace.
Leader: We stand together, remembering the doctors, health care workers and the other
innocent people who have given their lives in the struggle for our right to choose.
Leader: We have heard the cries of hungry children; our hearts are opened to women
who live in terror for their lives; we refuse to deny the abuses and we refuse to accept the
violence that threatens our safety and profanes the name of God.
Leader: With our eyes we see and with our hearts we feel the pain of war and
oppression; poverty and homelessness; racism and sexism; homophobia and violence.
All: As people of God we seek justice. We are praying people who are pro-choice. We
accept the responsibility, claim the tradition and we embrace the right to choose
prayerfully with the knowledge that God is with us in all of our circumstances.

Meditation
Enable me, God, to use the days ahead

Not in bitterness or in despair, but in love.
May the words of my heart flow freely
To the hearts of those beside me.
Let no walls of silence be erected between us
Lest we be alone when together.
We who have shared so much of life

Still have the opportunity to create
Even more precious memories.
As we speak of life’s eternal meaning
Let us sense the tenderness
In the clasp of our hands,
And in the wordless message of the glimpse of our eyes.
Grant us, O God, the strength

That comes with acceptance,
The faith that enters with your presence.
In the days ahead, help us to build treasures
Of courage, wisdom and understanding,
Not just for ourselves,
But for those about us.
Let this be our goal for the days ahead.
Stories from Women’s Lives
Story I: The Power of Saying God-She

Melanie Morrison
from The Grace of Coming Home
A friend, whom I will call Carol, contacted me not long ago in great anguish. She told me
that the careful contraceptive precautions that she and her husband, Paul, practiced had
failed and she was pregnant. For a number of reasons, including age and physical
complications in her last pregnancy, Carol could not imagine carrying, birthing and
raising another child.
Carol’s religious upbringing had, however, ingrained in her the conviction that abortion
was murder. Although she articulated many reasons to terminate the pregnancy, she

feared that she and her husband might later regret an abortion. Her deepest fear, however,
was that God would never forgive her.
After much turmoil, prayer, tears, conversation with friends, and vacillation, she and her
husband chose to have the abortion. Carol and I talked often. I had no simple answers,
but she didn’t look to me for answers anyway. She needed me to hear her pain, her fear,
her sense of desolation.
Because I live in another part of the country, I couldn’t be with her physically the day she
went for the abortion. I wanted, nevertheless, to be present with her somehow, so at the
time I knew she was entering the clinic, I lit a candle and prayed for her. What transpired
is difficult to describe.
At first, my prayers were beseeching, “Please, God, be with Carol, keep her safe. Please
let her know she is loved…” almost as though I needed to convince God that Carol
deserved this divine attention. When I realized how I was praying, I chose consciously to
address God as She, and my prayers changed. Instead of “please,” I was saying, praying,
“I know you know that sometimes we must face impossible, agonizing decisions. I know
you know this pain and that you hold Carol tight at this moment, for she is your beloved.”
Carol called me later that day and told me how Paul, against the policy of the doctor’s
office, had insisted on being present with her during the abortion. He had held her and
wept with her. Carol expressed how, in Paul’s touch and tears, she experienced God’s
presence. She said, “You know, before the surgery, I couldn’t believe that God would be
there or that He would ever forgive me. . .” Carol paused. “He, She, whatever…” She
paused again and then said, “No, if God is a She, then God understands.”
I then told Carol about my prayer experience that morning and my conviction that She
does understand the struggle, the loss and the pain. Carol replied, “Yes, I believe that
now, too. I believe God was with me even there in that place I so dreaded to be.”
Story II: Congressional Testimony of Claudia Crown Ades

In October of 1992 I was six months pregnant with our first child…It was Rosh
Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. My husband and I were informed that our baby was
plagued with severe anomalies. My baby stood no chance of survival.
His condition was called trisomy 13, a fatal chromosomal disorder; a fetus with this
disorder rarely survives to the third term. Our precious son was dying. Gone were the
hopes of a dearly wanted pregnancy. As his mother and father, we could not, in good
conscience, allow our baby to suffer. In consultation with our doctors and family and our
God we made the difficult choice to terminate my pregnancy.

The day of my surgery is another day I’ll surely never forget. My cervix was dilated to
make passage easier. A small amount of fluid was removed from my baby’s skull using a
needle to slightly compress my son’s head in order to gently ease him from my womb.
He passed away peacefully…
It was Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. It is the day we mourn those who
have passed away. I’ll forever mourn my son’s death.
Story III: Excerpt from a Sermon

Rabbi Jack Segal
I had received a call from a 26-year-old Jewish girl. She said to me: “Rabbi Segal, I am
from North Carolina, but I am staying at the Florence Crittendon Home downtown in
Houston. I cannot come to your synagogue but I need very much to talk to a rabbi and I
would like to speak to the rabbi as soon as possible. Could you please come visit me?”
When I arrived at the Florence Crittendon Home, the young Jewish woman told me that
she was a college graduate and had a master’s degree. She also told me that she had
worked for two years as a high school teacher but that she was unmarried—and almost
nine months pregnant. She said that she had been lonesome living in a small North
Carolina city and had had a brief affair with another teacher who was also a member of
the faculty of her high school. When he learned of the pregnancy, he said that he wanted
to marry her. But she told him that that was impossible because he was a Baptist and she
was a Jew and neither one was going to convert.
She told me that she wanted me to help her get the baby adopted by a young Jewish
couple. I told her that I would definitely help her.
In fact, I was actually present at St. Joseph’s Hospital when this young woman gave birth
to her child. Even though the Florence Crittendon Home for unmarried women and the
St. Joseph’s Hospital had a rule that the mother could not see the baby or hold the baby
after delivery if she had agreed to give it up for adoption, this young woman bamboozled
the nuns and the nurses and was allowed to hold the baby for 30 minutes.
When I returned, this young woman said to me: “I cannot give up my little boy now that I
have seen him.”
She wept and wept for quite some time before she decided to rescind that decision and
give up her baby. Even when I eventually left her room, three hours later, she was still
weeping—and I had a deep feeling that three months later she was still weeping, and
possibly even three years later she was still weeping.

Song: Pray for a World
Words: Professor Ruth Duck

Music: Old 100th (Protestant Doxology)
Pray for a world where ev’ry child

Finds welcome in a sheltered place,
Where love is tender, undefiled,
And firmness intertwines with grace.
Pray for a world where passion’s fire

Burns not in force or careless lust;
Where God’s good gift of deep desire
Is safe in arms of faith and trust.
Pray for a nation that is fair

And seeks the welfare of us all,
Where leaders guide with prudent care
To nurture life both great and small.
Pray for a world where all have voice
And none will batter, rape, abuse;
Till then, may all have rightful choice
And pray for wisdom as they choose.

Eulogy for Women Denied Choice
Maxine Parshall
A million abortions a year and before

Roe few were done by a doctor—with sterile instruments—in a sterile environment.
A million abortions a year since anyone started keeping records.
Hundreds of thousands of you putting your lives in the hands of strangers with all manner
of contraptions, none of which should ever have been allowed to touch a human body.
But you were so desperate and afraid.
How many of you survived the coat hangers and knitting needles, the non-sterile
injections, the perforations and infections?
How many women?

How many of our mothers?
How many of our daughters?
I want never to forget you, both the maimed and the dead.
I will think of you with kindness.
You—a mother who dearly loved the children you already had but who knew that one
more baby would stretch your family’s and your own resources to a point where grim
determination becomes desperation.
You—still recovering from the battering you got when they jumped you, tearing your
self-respect from your clothes, laughing at your terror as they took their turn; you still
saw their faces in nightmares.
And you—little more than a child yourself except that your body could conceive the need
of a troubled parent.
You were her mother.

You were his grandmother.
You were my sister.
I want never to forget you, any of you.
I want to think of you only with kindness and love.
Adapted by the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice

A Service of Memory and Dedication
This service is based on materials prepared by the Oklahoma Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
and the Iowa Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice.
Opening
Leader: Holy One, we gather here tonight to form a community that seeks
your truth and asks for your guidance and strength. Direct us in all our
doings that they may be offered to your honor and glory and for the
well-being of all people.
Leader: As we bless the source of life,

People: so are we blessed.
Prayer for Clergy and Lay Counselors Who Counsel Women
Source of Wisdom, Spirit of Love, we pray for all those persons, both lay and clergy,
who do your holy work of listening to and helping women sort out their options.
Give them a portion of your gentle and nurturing spirit so that their guidance will uphold
and respect each woman’s own conscience and beliefs. Help them to withhold judgment
and offer hope. Help them to carefully listen and wisely speak. Help them to open
themselves to new ideas and put away their prejudices. And may they never unknowingly
wound those already in pain.
May your presence in their lives excite them to enhance their counseling skills and
nurture your gift of discernment. Enable each of them to offer themselves in holy service
even as they strive to maintain themselves as whole persons. And may they see in the
face of all who invite them to share their journey of struggle and decision-making your
own real presence.

Prayer for Providers of Women’s Health Care
Gracious Provider of Care and Protection, we remember and stand with health care
professionals who furnish health care for women. We give thanks for their commitment
to protect the privacy of their patients and to treat them with the dignity and respect they
deserve.

We give thanks especially for the doctors and nurses and other health care workers who
serve the reproductive health care needs of women. Who train women to use
contraception safely and responsibly, who educate teenagers about intercourse and its
consequences, who counsel women at risk to conceive children with genetic and
hereditary problems, who explore options with women who have problem pregnancies,
who refer women to responsible adoption agencies, who support women through abortion
services, who recognize the rights of women to make reproductive choices.
We pray for an end to the rhetoric and violent acts that target health care providers and
pray for the day when health care providers, women and their families can exercise their
rights to reproductive choice in security and peace. Help us, Gracious God, to stand
together with these courageous and caring people who continue to do your holy work.

Memorial to Those Injured and Killed All Across the Country
We weep for the dead and wounded. Our endeavor is to fulfill their mission. As we name
each person who has been murdered by an anti-abortion terrorist, a candle will be lighted
in that person’s memory.
Dr. David Gunn of Pensacola, Florida

Dr. Wayne Patterson of Mobile, Alabama
Dr. John Britton of Pensacola, Florida
James Barrett of Pensacola, Florida
Shannon Lowney of Brookline, Massachusetts
Leanne Nichols of Brookline, Massachusetts
Officer Robert Sanderson of Birmingham, Alabama
Dr. Barnett Slepian of Amherst, New York
Let us pause for a moment of silence to remember all those who have lost their lives and
have been injured in attacks all across the country.
Silence
Help us, Gracious God, to remember the sacrifice made by these courageous and caring
people. Help us to rededicate ourselves to continue the work of securing and maintaining
all reproductive health care options for all people.


Responsive Prayer
Leader: We pray for freedom to choose—to choose to have children, but also to choose
not to have children.
All: Enable our compassionate caring for human life at every stage and in every form.
Leader: We pray for the parents and loved ones of those facing unwanted pregnancies.
Lead them to wise counsel and firm support.
All: Help us give one another loving support.
Leader: We pray for legislators, seeking to be responsive to their people. Lead them to
listen with compassion to the voices of women and their families who support choice.
All: Help us to listen to one another with openness and love.
Leader: We pray for the poor, unable to know the freedom so many enjoy and unable to
make choices because of their bondage to poverty.
All: Help us not to speed by on our highways, leaving them forgotten by the side of the
road.
Leader: We pray for our nation, bewildered and troubled by issues of reproductive
freedom.
All: Give us strengthened dedication as we seek reproductive freedom. Give us

strengthened dedication to recognize the good in all people. Let us never be satisfied until
each person and each group is extended reproductive freedom. Let us never be satisfied
until each person and each group has the opportunity to grow into the fullness of life.
Unite us in our search for the good of all humankind.
A Litany of Challenge
Diann Neu
Diann L. Neu is Co-Director of the Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual in Silver Spring
Maryland.
All: Let us go forth.
Leader: To stand, sit, cry, pray, with women making reproductive choices, especially the
difficult choice for abortion.

Leader: To speak to legislators, family members and friends of our support for women’s
decisions.
Leader: To challenge our synagogues, churches and holy congregations to affirm women
as moral agents.
Leader: To encourage rabbis, ministers, priests and counselors to counsel women on free
choice.
Leader: To the city centers and country corners to tell women that all of their choices,
including their choice for abortion, are holy and healthy.
Leader: In the name of the holy one, God of our mothers and God of our fathers, to bring
about justice.
Healing Response
Robert J. Dufford, S.J.
Leader: Be not afraid—you shall cross the barren deserts, but you shall not die of thirst.
You shall wander far in safety, though you do not know the way.
All: You shall speak your words in foreign lands, and they will understand. You shall see
the face of God and live.
Leader: Be not afraid—if you pass through raging waters in the sea, you shall not drown.
If you walk amid the burning flames, you shall not be harmed.
All: If you stand before the afflictions of life, and death is at your side, know that God is
with you through it all.
Leader: Blessed are the poor ones, for whom, when they cannot speak for themselves,
dedicated people must speak.

All: Blessed are you that weep and mourn, for one day you shall laugh and sing. And if
wicked ones insult and hate you, be not afraid.
Prayer for Pro-Choice Individuals Who Have Not Found Their Voices
Many religious people who are pro-choice believe, Eternal Word, that they have nothing
to say. Others believe that if they speak they will not be heard. Still others of us are afraid
to speak for fear that we will be taunted and made to feel foolish. Each is silent. And in
our silence we remain isolated, alone, fearful.
But our holy writings teach us that even when we remain silent, our hearts burn within us.
For we know that to remain silent makes us part of the problem, not part of the solution.
To remain in our isolation, paralyzed by our fears, keeps us safe—or does it?
Boldly we would ask that you use that holy fire in our bellies to empower us to break our
silence. Put that fire into our silent, pro-choice religious leaders as well as their silent,
pro-choice followers. Help them to know that if they but speak the truth of their lives that
it will light the world.

Meditation
Each one of us comes to this service at a different point in our own path, a different place
along the journey of our lives. And each one of us come to this place with different
needs.
Some hearts ache with sorrow:

Disappointments weigh heavily upon them, and they have tasted despair:
Families have been broken; loved ones lie on a bed of pain;
Death has taken those whom we cherished.
May our presence and our sympathy bring them comfort.
Some hearts are embittered:

They have sought answers in vain;
Have had their ideals mocked and betrayed;

Life has lost its meaning and value.
May the knowledge that we, too, are searching
Restore their hope that there is something to find.

Some spirits hunger:
They long for friendship; they crave understanding; they yearn for warmth.
May we in our common need gain strength from one another:
Sharing our joys, lightening each other’s burdens and praying for the welfare of the
community.
In acceptance of ourselves as we are, we move beyond the fragmentation that causes

pain, and look towards a time of wholeness and of peace.
And that, in the end, is the true meaning of “healing.” Not “curing,” not always, not for
each of us. But “wholeness,” a sense of integration, a sense of completion, a taste of
peace and shalom.

Prayer for Men
Creator God, we pray for men; those whom you have created to share in the conception
of life and share in the responsibility of raising children.
We ask that you would help them be all that you have created them to be. Help them to
see themselves as whole persons, so that they can help their partners and their children be
themselves as well. Help them to be present to their families if they’ve been too long
absent. Help them to speak out against injustice where they’ve been silent; help them to
be understanding and supportive of the pro-choice decisions of their sisters, mothers,
wives and female friends.
But most of all, God, give them the love and tenderness they need to be loving and
faithful partners. May they welcome the opportunity to be supportive of the children they
help bring into this world. Give them courage and strength to live according to your
guidance and wisdom always.

Prayer for Wise and Compassionate Leadership
Sovereign One, we pause in our prayers for women and men, children and youth—
prayers for various circumstances and decisions in their lives that need your presence and
care—to pray for our leaders.

We ask that you would speak to those who hold in their hands the destinies of others—
leaders of government and industry and science and the social order; political leaders,
spiritual leaders, intellectual leaders, education, business and financial leaders. Speak to
them of justice and wisdom and compassion. Give them the desire for service rather than
power, integrity rather than rhetoric, freedom for all rather than privilege for the few.
In these difficult and challenging times when the quality of our leadership is a reflection
of our own willingness to be involved in our schools and churches and synagogues, in our
neighborhoods and our communities, in our corporations and our labor unions, uphold us
when our leaders are in error and their actions harmful that we may have the wisdom to
understand and the courage to act. If we are weak or fearful, raise up prophets to correct
us. Sustain and encourage us when we are well led and our policies benefit the whole
human family.
Grant, Oh God, in your great mercy, that all those with grave responsibilities would be
faithful to the hopes of your people. And as they serve us, help them always to be wise
and just and compassionate, so that your people may prosper and live in peace.
The prayers conclude with:
Leader: In this time of silence, let us pray for our own needs and those of others not
named here tonight.
(Silence)

Closing Response
Leader: We rejoice in the freedom of our faith—though we are many, yet we are one.
All: Rejoice! For we are called to love and to learn, always revering the exalted quality of
human life which transcends mere existence.
Leader: We rejoice in the freedom to love and to sanctify life—we cherish all life and
would not diminish its quality in others.
All: For we are called to decision, to face the difficult moral and religious demands of our
age and land.
We are here to make a new beginning.
Now is the time for a new beginning—the end of terror, the triumph of courage.
We are the ones we have been waiting for.

Services of Healing

You Are Not Alone: Seeking Wisdom to Decide
Diann L. Neu
Diann L. Neu is Co-Director of the Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual in Silver Spring,
Maryland.
When a woman discovers she is unintentionally pregnant, she experiences a variety of

emotions and may feel that no one shares or understands her situation. She needs to seek
her own wisdom, to make a choice about her pregnancy.
This liturgy will help her focus on whether to bring her pregnancy to term or to have an
abortion. I have used it with women in counseling and in long distance telephone
conversations. It can be used in the quiet of one’s own room or with a trusted friend. I
have written it to be used with a friend so women will know they are not alone.
Preparation
Gather a candle, favorite instrumental music, paper and pencil. Choose a comfortable
place in a favorable location. First, play soothing instrumental music quietly in the
background. Then light a candle, absorb its power, pray.
Prayer
Gracious and loving Holy Wisdom, fill N. (name of woman) with wisdom that she may
know clearly the choice that she needs to make. Bless her and comfort her with your
Spirit.
Guided Imagination
(Guide the woman through this visualization.)
N., close your eyes, take a deep breath and feel your body begin to relax. Imagine
yourself walking on a path through the woods. You are walking into the future, your
future. At the end of this path, imagine yourself in ten years if you decide to bring this
pregnancy to term. (Pause for three minutes and let mind and body realize this prospect.)
Now begin again. (Pause fifteen seconds.) Imagine another path through the woods. Walk
along this path. At the end of this path, experience yourself in ten years if you do not
bring this pregnancy to term. (Pause for three minutes and experience what this is like.)
After you have visualized these two pathways, think of a favorite place, the place where
you feel most comfortable, and imagine yourself there. Take a deep breath, let your body
relax and think about what you have experienced. (Pause for as long as you like.)

Reflection
Sit and watch the candle burn. Write down or draw your thoughts in a journal, dance your
feelings and/or share your insight with another. Reflect for as long as you like. Blow out
the candle when you are finished.
Closing
(When closure is appropriate.)
Wisdom comes when we reflect on our life and make choices based on honesty and truth.
Wisdom lives within us. Listen to her. Trust her. Talk with her whenever you need to.
She is your friend. She is the Holy One who is with you always. Seek to find wisdom and
love her fiercely.
Song
“i found god in myself” by Ntozake Shange, from colored girls who have considered
suicide/when the rainbow is enuf, c. 1980.
i found god in myself, i found god in myself

and i loved her fiercely, i loved her fiercely,
i found god in myself.
Afterwards
N., do something comforting now. Drink a cup of tea, take a warm shower, listen to
soothing music, take a walk in the garden.
Reprinted with permission from WATERwheel, Vol. 4, No. 4, 1992.
Diann L. Neu, Co-director of WATER

The Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual
8035 13th Street, Silver Spring, MD 20910 USA
Phone: 301-589-2509; Fax: 301-589-3150; E-mail:dneu@hers.com;
www.hers.com/water

Affirming a Choice
Diann L. Neu
Diann L. Neu is Co-Director of the Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual in Silver Spring,
Maryland.
Healthy reproductive choice includes the best medical, psychological and social support
available. It also includes spiritual support that we sometimes forget in making all-
important decisions and undergoing momentous events in our lives. We—friends,
ministers, counselors—need to develop and celebrate liturgies that affirm women’s
reproductive choices. Women may need encouragement to consider such a liturgy
because traditional churches and society do not provide them.
This liturgy affirms that a woman has made a good and holy decision to have an abortion.
It provides strength and healing after making a difficult choice. It brings closure to an
often intense and emotional process. It is intended to be celebrated with friends.
Preparation
Place on a cloth in the center of the circle: oil, symbols such as flower petals or dried
flowers, and a bowl that will be given to the woman as a gift. Invite her to choose a
favorite song, poem, reading or Scripture verse for the ritual.
Invite the woman who has made the decision, her partner, if appropriate, and supportive
friends to gather for affirmation.
Call to Gather
Welcome. Today we gather with our friend, N. (name of woman), to affirm that she has
made a choice to have an abortion. She needs our support.
Song
(Play or sing a favorite, comforting song, one that the woman likes.)
Prayer
Let us pray. Blessed are you, Holy Wisdom, for your presence with N. Praised be you,
Mother Goddess and Father God, that you have given your people the power of choice.
We are saddened that the life circumstances of N. (woman’s name and, if appropriate, her
partner’s name) are such that she has had to choose to terminate her pregnancy. Such a
choice is never simple. It is filled with pain and hurt, with anger and questions, but also
with integrity and strength. We rejoice in her attention to choice.

Our beloved sister has made a very hard choice. We affirm her and support her in her
decision. We promise to stand with her in her ongoing life.
Blessed are you, Holy Wisdom, for your presence with her.
Reading
(Choose a poem, reading or Scripture verse that captures the message of the liturgy.)
Sharing
(The celebrant invites the woman (and her partner) to speak about her (their) decision to
have an abortion. If there is a symbolic gesture that expresses her (their) feeling, such as
sprinkling flower petals, burning a rose, or sharing dried flowers, invite her (them) to
incorporate it into the sharing.)
Blessing
N., we love you very deeply. As a sign of our affirmation of you and of your choice, we
give you this bowl and this oil. Oil soothes bones that are weary from making a difficult
decision. Oil strengthens and heals. Oil… (Add sentences that reflect what the woman
said in her story.)
We bless you with this oil. Come, friends, take oil from the bowl and massage N.’s
hands, face, feet, neck, shoulders and head. Close your blessing by embracing her.
N., the bowl is a tangible symbol of this day. When times are difficult—and such days
come to each of us—look at this bowl and remember our love for you. We bless you, N.,
and promise to be with you on your way.
Closing Song
(Close the liturgy with a blessing song like the following: “Blessing Song” by Marsie
Silvestro, from Circling Free, c. 1982.)
Bless you, my sister, bless you on your way

You have roads to roam before you’re home
And winds to speak your name.
So go gently, my sister, let courage be your song

You have words to say in your own way
And stars to light your night.

And if ever we grow weary and our heart song
Has no refrain
Just remember we’ll be waiting to raise you up again.
And we’ll bless you, our sister, bless you in our way
And we’ll welcome home all the life you’ve known
And softly speak your name.
Bless you, our sister, bless you on your way.
Reprinted with permission from WATERwheel, Vol. 4, No. 4, 1992.
Diann L. Neu, Co-director of WATER

The Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual
8035 13th Street, Silver Spring, MD 20910 USA
Phone: 301-589-2509; Fax: 301-589-3150; E-mail:dneu@hers.com;
www.hers.com/water

Ceremony for Closure after an Abortion
Reverend Dr. Kendyl Gibbons
Reverend Dr. Gibbons is the minister of the First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis.
(This gathering took place at the home shared by a man and woman in a committed
relationship, who had decided to have an abortion when the woman found that she was
pregnant. They had invited several close friends to be present. There were twelve of us all
together. The minister and the couple sat on the floor beside a low table, which held a
vase with a white rosebud and a pottery bowl half full of water.)
Gathering Music: We used “Turn, Turn, Turn”
Reading: “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost
Introduction
We have gathered today to honor the importance of a decision made by ______ and
______. It was a difficult and painful decision not to bring to completion a pregnancy
which had resulted from their love for one another. Recognizing the finitude inherent in
the human condition, they have chosen to affirm some aspects of life while denying
others. Thoughtful and caring people will never find this a trivial event. Together we
hallow a place and a moment to speak the words of sorrow, regret, commitment and
continuing affirmation that acknowledge their choice, and its cost. We, the community of
memory and hope, bear witness to the seriousness with which ______ and ______ mark
this event, and to the promises they make in observance of it. We give them our support
in the act by which they would release the energy and creativity which might have been
their child, from the bonds of their grief and guilt, into the fathomless universe of
potential, there to find other form.
Affirmation of Responsibility
______, do you acknowledge an equal share of responsibility in this dilemma, claiming

the pain of loss and the moral ambiguities of your joint decision?
Will you continue to cherish ______ and share her life, receiving from her and offering
her such comfort as you may?
______ , do you acknowledge ______ as an equal partner in this dilemma, entitled to

share both the process of choice, and the grief?
Will you continue to cherish him and share his life, receiving from him and offering him
such comfort as you may?

Statement: (The man spoke spontaneously of how hard it had been to make the decision,
and how much he appreciated the support of those who gathered for this ceremony.)
Statement: (The woman read a short poem she had written shortly after the abortion.)
Ritual
(Spoken by the minister)

We use the petals of a budding rose as a symbol of all the potential which might have
been incarnated in ______ and ______’s child. With loving grief, we release that
potential to other incarnations in the infinite womb of the universe, from which
nothing is ever lost.
(The minister breaks the petals from the stem of the rose, and gives them to the couple to
hold. Then the minister says:)
However gently, the bud is broken.

In pain and sorrow the Word is spoken:
Not every essence shall come to be;
It is in choosing that we are free.
(The couple scatters the petals on the water in the bowl.)
Commitments
(The minister asks:) ______ and ______, you have availed yourself of the freedom that is
our human birthright, and you know that the price of all freedom is responsibility. I ask of
you now four promises, in consideration of the choice that you have made together.
First, will you pledge to support, with whatever resources you may be able, the legal,
moral and practical right of others in our society to have the option of making the choice
you made?
Second, will you more dearly treasure all the children, of your own acquaintance and of
our larger community, touching their lives with gentleness and hope, in honor of the child
that might have been?
Third, if the time should come in your life when you shall be able to be parents, will you
be loving, patient, tender and respectful of the children you do create, for their own sakes,
and a little beyond, for the sake of the one you could not welcome?

Finally, if ever in your life together you find yourselves with a garden, will you plant and
tend a rose, remembering the broken petals that were your sorrow in the time when you
had no garden?
Statements of support from the gathered community: (People spoke spontaneously of

their love for the couple, the difficulty of one of their own decisions and how honored
they were to be part of the ceremony.)
(The minister says:)

To complete our ritual of affirmation and regret, we shall return these symbolic elements
to the larger world of nature, in the creek at a nearby park. We invite you to continue
your support of ______ and ______ by going with us.
(Proceed to creek)
(The minister reads:)

The great religious educator Sophia Fahs wrote:
So the children come

and so they have been coming.
Always in the same way they came—
Born of the seed of man and woman.
No angels herald their beginnings.

No prophets predict their future courses.
No wise men see a star to show where to find
the babe that will save humankind.
Yet each night a child is born is a holy night.
Fathers and mothers

sitting beside their children’s cribs
feel glory in the sight of a new life beginning.
They ask, Where and how will this new life end?
Or will it ever end?
Each night a child is born is a holy night—

time for singing,
time for worshipping,
time for wondering.
The choice that ______ and ______ have made is also a sacred choice; a choice for
coherence and responsibility in life. In recognition of all the unrealized potentials in all

our lives and all our choices, we release the energy of what might have been into the
fathomless ocean of holy creativity which is our universe. Joy and woe are woven fine,
says the poet; in all the beauty and tragedy of the world that is yet to be, this energy
will be present.
(The contents of the bowl are poured into the stream by the couple.)
(The minister says:)

I am a thousand winds that blow;
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
All these and more—the laughter of other children, the tenderness of all love—will owe a
particle of their sweetness to this life refused. Therefore be at peace, and do not cling to
your regret. Rather, live lives that in their depth and fullness give meaning to this
decision.
And I shall be telling this with a sigh,

Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference.
Peace be to you and to us all.

Funeral Service for Miscarriage
Rabbi Dana Magat
Rabbi Magat is spiritual leader of Temple Emmanuel in San Jose, California.
The following may be said at many different settings such as a gravesite, synagogue,
sanctuary, Bet Tefillah or memorial service at the home of the parent(s).
It is possible that no parent or only one parent will want to participate. Thus the service
should be changed according to the needs of the mourner(s). If no parent is comfortable
participating, then the leader should read the parts of the ceremony which he/she feels is
appropriate.
Leader: Our lives and the lives of our loved ones are rooted in a profound mystery, past
our understanding. In the face of eternity, we are made simple. Though we know our
destiny is to tarry but a while, the time of separation brings anguish and grief. May we
bear our burden; may we struggle through the darkness with courage to find our way
again.
Leader: For everything there is a season,

A time for every experience under heaven;
A time to be born and a time to die;
A time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted;
A time to tear down and a time to build up;
A time to grieve and a time to dance;
A time to throw stones and a time to gather stones;
A time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to seek and a time to lose;
A time to keep and a time to discard;
A time to tear and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence and a time to speak.
(From Ecclesiastes 3)
Parents: We seek strength today from our family and friends as we reaffirm our
commitment to the value of life. Let the potential of our dear child live on in us as a
blessing, even though we were never given the opportunity to know him/her.
[If the baby-to-be has been given a name then replace her/his and him/her with the child’s
name.]
Mother: This child that I bury today I knew from within my womb. I felt her/his presence
within me and now I grieve and mourn his/her death. I will never hold her/his hand. I will

never hug him/her. I will never see her/his smile, hear him/her cry, laugh and sing. I will
never see her/him grow up to be an adult.
Father: No first steps, no words, no birthdays, no hugs, nothing. I have been cheated and
today I mourn.
Leader: From this time of sorrow, may we acquire a heart of wisdom; acknowledging that
all things, great and small, must come to an end of days.
May the feelings of despair and sadness be tempered by the warmth and caring you feel
toward one another.
Blessed is the source of life, fountain of being, by whose power existence flows and ebbs.
[Rabbinic address followed by a moment of silence.]
O God, heal the sorrowing hearts of your children, ______ and ______. Help us to reach
out and embrace them in this time of sadness, when questions must go unanswered, and
the only response is our loving care.
May ______ and ______ be strengthened by our community and by loved ones. May
they be consoled by the strength of their love for each other.
May the soul of this child be taken to the reservoir of souls and bound up in the source of
life which flows through each of us.
[The prayer “El Malei Rachamin” may be said here.]
[The following can be said at a gravesite or as a continuation of the memorial service or

as part of a tree planting ceremony.]
[If there is a casket, it is lowered and the following is said:]
[Psalm 23 might be said here. An egalitarian version is found in the CCAR Rabbis
Manual on pages 118-119.]
Parents:
In the rising of the sun and in its going down, we remember.
In the blowing of the wind and in the chill of winter, we remember.
In the opening of buds and in the rebirth of spring, we remember.
In the rustling of leaves and in the beauty of autumn, we remember.
In the beginning of the year and when it ends, we remember.
When we are weary and in need of strength, we remember.

When we are lost and sick at heart, we remember.
When we have joys we yearn to share, we remember.
So long as we live, the memory of ______
shall live, for as he/she was a part of us physically, she/he will
always be a part of us spiritually.
Leader:
Though we mourn the loss of ______ we can find comfort in the hope that ______ and
______ will have the opportunity to bring new life into the world. Not as a replacement,
but as part of the ongoing cycle of life of which we are all a part.
[If tree planting is desired the leader may want to say a word about the tree being a part
of the cycle of life.]
Leader:
The light of life is a finite flame. Like a candle, life is kindled; it burns, it glows, it is
radiant with warmth and beauty. But soon it fades; its substance is consumed, and it is no
more.
In light we see; in light we are seen. The flames dance and our lives are full. But as night
follows day, the candle of our life burns down. There is an end to the flames. We see no
more and are no more seen. Yet we do not despair, for we are more than a memory
slowly fading into the darkness. With our lives we give life. Our memory can never die,
we move in the eternal cycle of darkness and death, of light and life.
[At this point the leader would read the Mourners’ Kaddish.]
Leader:
As we place dirt on this casket [or around this tree] we are reminded not only of the finite
nature of humanity, but of the fragility of life. Each of us will die. Each of us will return
to the dust from which we came. By holding this dirt in our hands we affirm our own
mortality.
[Each member of the family would now take dirt and place it in the coffin or around the
tree.]

Special Events

Family Life Education: Remarks to the State Legislature
Reverend Julie Denny-Hughes
Reverend Denny-Hughes presented these remarks at the General Assembly in Richmond, Virginia on
January 28, 1998. Reverend Denny-Hughes is currently minister of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship
of Raleigh, North Carolina.
Good morning. I am here to speak on behalf of a woman’s right to control her own
reproductive health and to speak on behalf of respectful and medically accurate sex
education for our young people.
I have come to my pro-choice decision because I am a woman, a mother, a citizen and a

pastor. Because the pro-choice position respects women and it respects our religious
differences.
As a woman, a mother and a citizen, I trust other women to make decisions about their
own bodies and I expect to be trusted to make decisions about mine without interference
from the government or pressure from special interest groups whose interests I may not
share.
As a pastor, I am pro-choice for two reasons. First, because my faith teaches me that
every person is a person of inherent worth and dignity. With that as a basis, I am called to
treat with dignity the decision that any woman makes regarding her own reproductive
health. I will counsel and pray with that woman, but the decision is hers and I must leave
her ultimately with herself and the god of her understanding—a god I trust to be one of
compassion who feels her suffering and confusion. Then I must support that decision.
And second, I am pro-choice because the conversation around abortion frequently centers
on the question of when life begins. I don’t know the answer to that, nor does anyone
else. There are eternal mysteries. And we don’t have answers to all the questions life
presents. What we cling to in the face of not-knowing is called “belief.” And in this
country, so far, all religious beliefs are protected.
I celebrate with you today the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. I celebrate with you
reproductive freedom and religious freedom.
I am also speaking today in support of reinstating the mandate for Family Life Education
in our public schools.
More specifically, I support a sex education curriculum that is medically accurate, age
appropriate and value-free. One that demonstrates respect for the truth and respect for our
young people. I support this because it is the smart thing to do and because it is the right
thing to do. And because the young adults I spoke to who had Family Life Education in

the Henrico Schools were horrified that the curriculum might disappear or be changed in
any fundamental way.
It is the smart thing to do because the mandated program has been shown to be effective
as a factor in reducing unwanted teen pregnancy by 20 percent and abortions by 40
percent. The fact that this curriculum has proven itself as a positive force in the lives of
young Virginians doesn’t mean we’re finished and can do without it. On the contrary, it
means that we must keep it available for every child who comes through our public
schools.
It is smart and it is right and the young people appreciate it. As a pastor I want girls and
boys and young women and men to grow up in an atmosphere of respect, so that they can
learn to respect themselves and make life decisions in their own best interests. Teaching
them the truth about their bodies is a respectful thing to do.
I would vehemently oppose any sex-education curriculum that instills fear or that
presents a single method of preventing pregnancies, namely abstinence. We live in a
complex and highly sexualized culture and our children and young people are naturally
curious. In such an explosive time as this, they need all the defenses we can provide to
help them make it through to adulthood without unwanted pregnancy and without
contracting sexually transmitted diseases.
We’re the grown-ups. We have a responsibility. Parents apparently still aren’t assuming
the role of sex educators in their homes (maybe because they never got adequate
education) so it is left to the schools—and the churches—in a collaborative, not a
combative, mode of mutual respect. As public citizens we need to support the mandate
and render unto the schools that which is the schools’—the responsibility for transmitting
information in an honest, age-appropriate and value-free manner. As religious persons we
need to render unto the churches that which is the churches’—namely, the responsibility
for the moral and spiritual guidance from each of our own faith traditions that will help
our children grow up healthy and whole.
Together we can ensure that they learn what they need to keep their bodies whole and
their spirits intact.
I respectfully encourage the General Assembly, therefore, to reinstate the mandate for
Family Life Education in our public schools. It’s the least we can do for these young
people whose futures and whose very lives are in our trust.
Thank you.

Breaking the Silence about Sexuality in The Black Church
Reverend Veazey is president and CEO of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice and a minister
of the National Baptist Convention U.S.A. He is a founder of The Black Church Initiative and received the
Ms. Foundation’s Gloria Steinem Award for his work on behalf of women and girls.
April 4 marks the anniversary of the death of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
However, I choose to celebrate his life and reflect upon his work. After all, he was the
voice in the wilderness crying out against racial hatred and intolerance. From the pulpits
of churches, he along with other Black clergy and parishioners broke the silence and laid
the foundation for a community to stand with dignity against terrorism and inequality.
African-Americans have made great strides in our political, social, and economic life
since Dr. King's assassination, in great part due to his legacy. Because he believed in us,
we persevered, and it is his dream that motivates me to rekindle the spirit of the Black
church and break the silence around issues of sex and sexuality. I also have a dream.
In the church I pastored for more 32 years, I rarely addressed the serious reproductive
health challenges that affect the very well-being of our families and communities. I did
not feel prepared theologically. Sex was a taboo subject in the church. When I came to
the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice in 1996, I realized many clergy, like me,
needed training to learn to approach the subject of sexuality prayerfully and realistically.
My colleagues and I developed The Black Church Initiative of the Religious Coalition for
Reproductive Choice to assist Black religious leaders and the African-American
community in addressing teen childbearing, sexuality education and other reproductive
health issues within the context of African-American culture and religion. Like Dr. King,
we stepped out on faith, believing Black clergy and laity could have a powerful impact on
the future of African-American life. We have been proven right. Hundreds of clergy from
churches all across the country have taken part in our National Black Religious Summits
on Sexuality and our faith-based sexuality education training. Together, we have talked
about teen pregnancy, HIV/AIDS, reproductive choice, sexual orientation, domestic
violence, and much more. Churches that have been silent on these issues for too long are
no longer silent.
I do this work out of my deepest religious convictions. I believe that women are free
moral agents, able to make complex decisions. I am committed to religion being inclusive
of all people, of all races and sexual orientations. To me, the ability to make reproductive
choices is a matter of social justice, nothing less. I will never forget a 12-year-old girl
who became pregnant and was sent away to California to have her baby. Fearful and
unsure, she induced her own abortion. When this was discovered, the authorities were
brought in and she was charged with manslaughter. Even though the family managed to
have the charges removed, no one could remove the scar from a young girl’s mind and

heart. She went on to complete college, to marry and have a beautiful family. Then her
daughter was killed in an accident and her mind went back to California. She believed the
accident was a punishment for the abortion she had as a 12-year-old. So I say sadly, if
only there had been Roe v. Wade and the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
and ministers providing All Options Clergy Counseling to young women in crisis. There
is so much guilt. I never want another person to go through what she has.
And I do this work for my black community because we have been in pain from the
cruelty of segregation and discrimination. When I see our young Black brothers and the
violence around us, when I think of the sacrifices of Medgar Evers, Martin Luther King
Jr., Fanny Lou Hamer—I know we must continue the struggle for social justice, and
social justice includes women having reproductive freedom.
Despite racist terrorism, Dr. King broke the silence in the 1960’s through creative non-
violence. With the same kind of dignity and grace in the face of adversity, the Religious
Coalition through its Black Church Initiative and The National Black Religious Summits
on Sexuality is having an impact on a community and a country—one church, one
mosque, one ministry at a time.
On April 4, I celebrate the life and work of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and I
pray that our steps, as his, are being ordered in the Word. Thank you, dear brother, for the
ability to dream and thank you for giving us hope.

Six Billion People—A Matter of Consequence
Marjorie Signer and Cynthia Cooper
Ms. Signer of the Religious Coalition and Ms. Cooper of the Center for Reproductive Law and Policy wrote
this sermon to observe the Day of Six Billion, October 12, 1999, the day marked to observe the birth of the
six billionth person. It can be used at any time for a discussion of reproductive choice and women’s and
girls’ empowerment or in conjunction with international days.
They shall not labor in vain or bear children in calamity; for they shall be
offspring blessed by the Lord—and their descendants as well.
Isaiah 65:20-23
October 12, 1999 was designated the Day of Six Billion by the United Nations. It was,
according to some calculations, the day when the six billionth person was born. Never
before have there been so many people on Earth at one time. And it has happened
relatively quickly. It took all of human history until 1804 for the population to reach its
first billion. In 1960, we were three billion. We have doubled our number in just thirty-
three years. Six billion, we are told, is a matter of consequence.
What do all these numbers tell us?
In the wonderful book The Little Prince by Antoine de St. Exupery, the little prince
travels from planet to planet to add to his knowledge. On one planet he finds a man who
spends all of his time counting and has reached the number of five hundred and one
million. “Five hundred and one million what?” asks the little prince. The man, annoyed at
the interruption, answers, “Millions of those little objects which one sometimes sees in
the sky.” “Flies?” asks the little prince. “Oh, no,” says the man. “Little golden objects
that set lazy men to idle dreaming.” “Ah, you mean the stars?” says the little prince. “And
what do you do with five hundred millions of stars?” The man explains that he writes the
number on a little paper and then puts the paper in a drawer and locks it. “I am concerned
with matters of consequence: I am accurate.” The little prince is puzzled. For what is of
consequence to the little prince is a flower that he waters every day and three volcanoes
that he cleans out every week, since he is of use to the flower and of use to the volcanoes.
And these, he announces to the man, are true matters of consequence.
So as we reach the Day of Six Billion, it is useful to consider what are matters of
consequence. The number six billion alone provokes fear and wonder. What will happen?
How can we possibly gain control of this situation?
The real issue is not the numbers. The real issue is the quality of life of every one of the
six billion. This is a matter of consequence in the eyes of God and of man. Behind that
huge number of six billion are children with hopes and men with expectations and
women with ideals—people all over the world who look at the stars and dream of better

lives, of safe lives and fulfilling lives. Behind the numbers are names and prayers and
loved ones.
The opening chapters of the book of Genesis show us a God who loves and values all of
creation. Men and women are created in the image of God and regarded equally by God.
They equally share the responsibility of stewardship for the Earth. (Genesis 1:26-28)
After the flood, God makes a covenant with the descendants of Noah and with “every
living creature.” (Genesis 9:9-10) If we are to be good stewards of the Earth, we must
strive to make our planet just and sustainable for all. We must care about and care for
each of the six billion—and more to come.
For many more are to come. The United Nations projects that there will be nine billion
people on Earth in just fifty years. How will we deal with this matter of consequence?
God’s covenant with Abraham and Sarah demonstrates that human life and reproduction
are intended by God to be a blessing for the world. By promising to make their
descendants “as numerous as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore,”
God intended to bless all the nations of the world through them. (Genesis 22:17-18)
The proper stewardship of human reproduction should result in a blessing for the peoples
of the world and for the Earth in general. For this reason, we must strive to ensure that the
birth of each child is a blessing for that child, for his or her family, and for the world in
general. We must strive to ensure that families have reproductive choices that they may
freely make—including family planning and contraception for all, regardless of their
ability to pay; high-quality health care for women, children, and families; safe, legal, and
affordable abortion services for women who make that choice; and realistic sexuality
education. We must eliminate violence against women—for violence makes a mockery of
our efforts to ensure women have choices. We must insist on—and work for—women’s
full equality. Putting women’s rights first is a matter of consequence, not only for women
and not only for human rights, but for the future development of the world.
At the heart of God’s covenant at Mount Sinai is a fundamental concern for the poor and
the well-being of the land. We in the United States have too often not been good and just
stewards of our planet. When we have thought about population growth, we have often
blamed developing countries such as India and China. We have often avoided thinking
about the excessive consumption of the wealthy countries. The affluent few have
perpetuated most of the environmental degradation in the world. Our nation has the
highest population growth rate in the industrialized world and one of the highest
consumption rates. This is surely a matter of consequence. We must learn to live more
simply so that others may simply live.
Half of the six billion people on the planet are youths, under the age of 25. More than 95
percent of them live in developing countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Many of

them will have difficulties finding jobs and raising and educating their children. Arable
land is getting scarce and there isn’t enough health care. What will their lives be like?
Half of the six billion people on the planet are women and girls, who are poorer, less
educated, and less likely to have decent jobs than men. In many countries, girls are
discriminated against in the most harmful ways—by getting less food, less education, and
less health care than boys. What will their lives be like?
Numbers, as the little prince knew, are not the problem and are not a solution. The
solution for us on the Day of Six Billion is to communicate support for reproductive
rights and reproductive health care at home and around the world, to our legislators and
government officials. Our government should move full speed ahead to ratify
international treaties that provide for women’s autonomy. We should provide funding for
international family planning and insist that women in the United States have access to all
forms of contraception and safe, legal, accessible abortion services. We must make good
on our promises to our own citizens of quality education and equality for all.
On the Day of Six Billion, let us begin to tear down the walls, the discriminatory laws,
the ignorance that prevents women at home and worldwide from embracing full and
complete lives. Let us see that every one of the six billion women, men, and children on
Earth today is accorded full human rights. In this way, we will be of use, as if we are
watering a flower and cleaning out volcanoes. And these, as we know, are matters of
consequence.
Let us conclude with the vision of the prophet Isaiah (65:20-23), which has never been
more appropriate than it is today.
“No more shall there be in [the world] an infant that lives but a few days, or an old
person who does not live out a lifetime…They shall build houses and inhabit them; they
shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they
shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be,
and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain or
bear children in calamity; for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord—and their
descendants as well.”

Dedication of Planned Parenthood Headquarters
Reverend Cynthia S. Bumb and
the Missouri Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
Reverend Bumb is executive director of Missouri Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice and an
ordained minister in the United Church of Christ. This blessing was offered on June 14, 1998.
This is the day which God has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it! Today, we join in
gratitude for the work of Planned Parenthood, for what has been and what is to be. This
work is holy work, service provided by God’s people on behalf of God’s people. We now
ask for God’s gracious blessing upon this work, upon this facility and upon all those who
will pass through these doors.
We ask for the blessing of commitment. We celebrate 66 years of dedicated service to

this community, and we look forward to many more years of building strong families.
May all who undertake this service be blessed with strength, dedication, good humor,
compassion. The blessing of commitment; O God, may it be so.
We ask for the blessing of skill. We celebrate the many talents that have brought this
facility into being. May this continue to be a place of wisdom, in which knowledge is
developed and shared. May healing and wholeness come to all who journey or labor here.
The blessing of skill; O God, may it be so.
We ask for the blessing of safety. We celebrate the unity of purpose, the caring and
compassion that make possible the distinguished mission of Planned Parenthood. May
this be a place of warmth and sanctuary, protected from the storms outside, sheltered
from those who would seek to do harm. The blessing of safety; O God, may it be so.
We ask for the blessing of hope. We celebrate the vision that has guided Planned
Parenthood through its many years of service, and into the future. May this be a place of
promise, so that all who enter these doors may find fulfillment and joy. The blessing of
hope, O God, may it be so.
Gracious God, your love surrounds us; your grace uplifts us. Your presence sustains us.
We ask this blessing today so that we ourselves may become a blessing for all whom we
encounter. May Planned Parenthood continue to be an instrument of your service, doing
the holy work of healing and caring for your creation. O Holy One, may it be so. And let
the people say, Amen!

Blessing for Providers of Women’s Health Care
Reverend Selzer is an Episcopal priest in Buffalo, New York; director of Concerned Clergy for Choice, a
project of Family Planning Advocates of New York State; and convener of the Western New York Religious
Coalition for Reproductive Choice.
Gracious Provider of Care and Protection,

Bless this building and those who work here,
The doctors and nurses and other health care workers
Who provide safe, legal, caring and loving reproductive health services,
including abortion, to women in need,
Who recognize the rights of women to make reproductive choices.
They are doing God’s work.

We celebrate their concern and commitment.
Drive away the forces of hatred and misogyny, the powers of evil and ill-will.
Keep away those who wish harm to the staff and the women.
Convert their hearts, open their minds,
End their violence and harassment,
That they might see their errors and repent.
Help them and us to know

That we are all created in your image,
And that you are a God of love and not of hate.
Amen.

Theology, Human Sexuality
and Reproductive Choice:
Individual Statements

Unitarian Universalism
Reverend Dr. Rebecca Edmiston-Lange
Reverend Edmiston-Lange is a Unitarian Universalist minister in Houston, Texas.
Unitarian Universalism, as part of the free religious tradition, has historically and
consistently stressed the inherent worth and dignity of every person and the right of
individual conscience in matters of religious faith and practice. While Unitarian
Universalists draw religious wisdom from many and varied sources, we believe that the
test of any religious position is an individual’s own direct experience of the good, the
holy and the true. Because of that starting point, Unitarian Universalism supports a
woman’s right of choice in reproductive matters, including the right to choose to
terminate an unwanted pregnancy.
Unitarian Universalists have a deep and abiding reverence for life. But we recognize,
also, that life is always lived in relationship. Thus, we maintain that moral decisions can
never be made in a vacuum but are, instead, always made in the context of competing
claims for attention to the quality of life. Women’s choices in reproductive matters are
morally complex. Such choices can be very difficult, even the occasion for grieving and a
profound sense of loss. Nonetheless, the difficulty of such choices does not mean that
they cannot also be a faithful and morally affirmative response to what a woman
perceives to be holy and just. Women are, inherently, moral agents, as are all people, and
they are capable of subtle and sensitive moral discernment.
On a pastoral level, Unitarian Universalist ministers would never seek to impose upon an
individual woman a certain pre-ordained course of action in matters of reproductive
choice. Rather, they would try to companion her in her quest to discern for herself what is
right—given her particular circumstances, the web of relationships in which she lives and
all that she holds to be sacred.
On the societal level, the Unitarian Universalist Association has steadfastly opposed any
attempt by the state to legislate one particular vision of morality in the arena of
reproductive choices. Recognizing that we live in a pluralistic society and that different
faith traditions have different approaches and teachings regarding this area of human
living, Unitarian Universalism has supported legislation which guarantees the
fundamental right of choice in reproductive matters. Moreover, Unitarian Universalism
has also begun to raise questions about the inequalities in the availability and distribution
of reproductive services. Unless women of all strata of society have access to a wide
range of safe and affordable reproductive services which honor a woman’s inherent
dignity, the right to choose remains an abstract and meaningless right. A “choice” which
cannot be exercised in a safe, accessible, supportive and affordable manner, is no choice
at all.

The Lutheran Church
Reverend Dr. Charles V. Bergstrom
Reverend Bergstrom, of West Yarmouth, Massachusetts, is a minister in the Evangelical Lutheran Church
in America and a member of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice’s Clergy Advisory Board.
Any article on human sexuality and reproductive choice begins with a clear recognition
that Lutherans are deeply divided on the issue. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America, of which I am a member, has statements supporting choice. The Lutheran
Church Missouri Synod has an active “pro-life” organization. Within my church, one
finds diverging views.
I write from the experience of 29 years in three New England congregations, 11 years
directing the church’s Office for Governmental Affairs, and 11 years as a consultant on
church/state matters. I write as one individual within the church, but with a pastoral
concern. I write with two principle themes—1) the theology of the church and 2) the
church’s relationship to government and legislation. My conviction is firm that a
religious organization in the United States should not seek to have its theology written
into federal laws, and the government should not define the theology of religious groups.
Lutherans believe that life is a gift from God. That life begins at the time of conception in
some form. Any decisions regarding life and its protection are of serious consequence.
We face such decisions at many levels, including the taking of life in warfare. I am not
acquainted with any freedom-of-choice persons who belittle the seriousness of abortion. I
do not know any “pro-abortionists.”
However, a fetus is not a person. As the 14th Amendment says, we are born or
naturalized as citizens. The Lutheran Statement on Abortion, adopted in 1991, states that
human life in all phases has intrinsic value, worth and dignity. Then it adds that “there
can be sound reasons for ending a pregnancy through induced abortion.” Lutherans live
in that theological complexity and make decisions that differ one from the other.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America reminds its members of this moral
complexity, urging us to give support to those making decisions regarding abortion. The
life of the mother, rape, incest, fetal abnormalities—these are examples of issues to be
faced. The church encourages public debate in a spirit of respect for those with whom
they differ. Appropriate forms of sex education in schools are supported.
People must be free to make decisions of reproductive choice without government

coercion. Again, Lutherans disagree on what laws might be helpful. This writer sees no
place for laws regarding abortion limitation. Former Senator Paul Simon put it well when
he said, “When the religious community is deeply divided on an issue, is it wise for the
government to step in?” I join fellow Lutheran Paul Simon in saying NO.

The 1991 Statement of the Evangelical Lutheran in America makes an honest confession
of failures in providing conditions more conducive for bringing new life into the world. It
addresses the needs for financial, nutritional, medical, educational, social, psychological
and spiritual support.
All of this goes beyond slogans and posters to the shaping of attitudes and values that
affirm people in whatever circumstances they find themselves. The church should give
pastoral care, compassionate outreach and life-sustaining assistance to those who bear
children as well as those who choose not to do so. Lutherans can work with others in this
challenge.

The Episcopal Church
Reverend Selzer is an Episcopal priest in Buffalo, New York; director of Concerned Clergy for Choice, a
project of Family Planning Advocates of New York State; and convener of the Western New York Religious
“All human life is sacred. Hence, it is sacred from inception until death. The Church
takes seriously its obligation to help form the conscience of its members concerning this
sacredness. Human life, therefore, should be initiated only advisedly and in full accord
with this understanding of the power to conceive and give birth which is bestowed by
God.” Resolution of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, 1988.
The Episcopal Church in the United States is a historic continuation of the Church of
England in the colonies and is a member of the worldwide Anglican Communion. As
such, it is not a church which is strong either in doctrine or teaching (as is the Roman
Catholic tradition) or in a confessional approach to faith (as in the Lutheran traditions).
This is both a blessing in that we are not struggling with doctrinal or confessional
teachings that often change with time and historical context, and a curse in that when
people ask what does the Episcopal church believe about this subject or that, the best we
can do is cite resolutions of our General Convention or give a response that looks at
tradition and custom and society. The church holds Scripture as sacred (both Hebrew and
Christian Scriptures, and to a lessor extent the Apocrypha), holds onto the Tradition of
the Church worldwide (the creeds and the historic traditions of ministry) and holds onto
the use of reason, conscience and experience of its members and society. Within these
three areas there is a fair amount of tension which individuals and groups within
the Church discuss, argue over and give resolutions for to General Convention. Even
then, with the Resolutions of the Church, its members do not agree or are bound; for
example, the Church has been on record since the late 1920s as being opposed to the
death penalty, but members (some very prominent in society such as former President
George Bush) often hold views clearly opposed. There is no censure or condemnation
from the Church for holding an opposite viewpoint; there is freedom of conscience to
disagree with the resolutions and teachings of the church.
Thus, in regard to viewpoints on human reproduction and human sexuality, we find

general agreements, but clearly a diversity of viewpoints and responses. The Bishops of
the Anglican Church condemned birth control in the 1920s, but in 1958 clearly said birth
control was not only acceptable for couples, but sometimes important, given the concerns
of world population and the need to limit the number of births. It was up to the couple
and their conscience to decide about the use of birth control, not the church. Given that
there was a paucity of biblical material on reasons for or against birth control, and
given that the tradition says not much that is apt for the current age, the bishops looked to
science and humanity to come to their understanding.

In 1967, the Episcopal Church affirmed abortion rights, within limits. This was six years
before the Roe v. Wade decision. Many clergy and laity have been leaders in the pro-
choice movement and very involved with Planned Parenthood. Still, there is clear dissent
from this viewpoint, as evidenced by the group known as National Organization of
Episcopalians for Life or NOEL. The Episcopal Women’s Caucus is a member of the
Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, and there are many Episcopalians who are
articulate and clear in their affirmation of a woman’s right to reproductive freedom.
We have no doctrine for this, only guidelines and concerns, which are articulated in the
paragraph cited at the beginning. In addition, the church has stated its opposition to
legislation restricting abortion (1988), in that such legislation does not address the root of
the problem, that is, unintended or unwanted pregnancies.
Does the Episcopal Church hold a pro-choice viewpoint? Yes, according to the
resolutions approved by our General Convention. Can a person be opposed to abortion
and still be an Episcopalian? Yes, according to the freedom of conscience granted
members of the church. Will the church ever have a doctrine dealing with reproductive
choice? Most likely not, in that it is not the way the church operates.

Conservative Judaism
Rabbi Neil Sandler
Rabbi Sandler is spiritual leader of Tifereth Israel Synagogue in Des Moines, Iowa, and represents the
Rabbinical Assembly on the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice Council of Governors.
A Jewish perspective on human sexuality begins with understanding the widely held
Jewish view, first annunciated by the rabbis of the Talmud nearly 2,000 years ago, that
human beings are God’s partners in the ongoing works of creation. If so, the world we
inhabit is never fully created. It requires our creative attention. As Rabbi Elliot Dorff has
written in “This Is My Beloved, This Is My Friend—A Rabbinic Letter on Intimate
Relations”:
This concept has far-reaching implications when applied to the area of

intimate relations. The sexual parts of our being—physical, emotional,
intellectual and spiritual—are not base or obscene; they are part of what
God termed “very good” after creating us on the sixth day of creation
(Genesis 1:31). Like all other parts of our being, we must use our sexual
faculties for good purpose, as defined by Jewish law and tradition, to
activate their potential for divinity, but we have not only the ability, but
the duty, to do that. Intimate relations, then, are not seen within Judaism as
simply physical release or the product of animalistic lust; they are, when
carried out in the proper context and way, no less than an expression of the
divine image within us.
Human sexual expression, then, is not only necessary. It is when carried out in
appropriate ways both “good” and “divine.”
Unfortunately, though, human creation sometimes goes awry, and ending a pregnancy
may become a painful consideration. Classically, Judaism does not recognize
“reproductive choice.” However, as a practical matter, so that people of faith may be able
to live in accordance with the dictates of their faith tradition regarding reproductive
matters, the Conservative Movement has, in effect, sanctioned choice since 1983.
What was its theological basis for doing so? In November 1983, the Committee on
Jewish Law and Standards (CJLS) of The Rabbinical Assembly adopted a statement on
the permissibility of abortion. In the Conservative Movement, questions of Jewish law
and practice are put before the CJLS for its consideration. Their positive decisions
become standards of valid practice for those who identify with the Conservative
Movement. In determining issues of Jewish legal concern, the CJLS examines the rich
body of Jewish tradition to determine what light these earlier sources might bring to the
issue at hand.

Examining the permissibility of abortion was no exception. While the fetus represents life
in potential, it is not equal in status to life outside the womb. This point is clear from the
Bible (Exodus 21:22-23) wherein a person who injures a pregnant woman and causes her
to miscarry is responsible only for monetary damage. This passage makes clear that the
offense is not a capital one which, in biblical times, would have mandated the loss of the
injurer’s life.
In the Mishna (Ohalot 7:6), a rabbinic text edited around the year 200CE, the fact that the
fetus does not hold the same status as a living human being outside the womb is even
clearer. There it is made explicit that, in the case of threat to the mother’s life, abortion is
to be carried out (perhaps it is even obligatory) up to the point of birth. As the statement
of the CJLS points out:
Later authorities have differed as to how far we might go in defining the

peril to the mother in order to justify an abortion. The Rabbinical
Assembly Committee on Jewish Law and Standards takes the view that an
abortion is justifiable if a continuation of pregnancy might cause the
mother severe physical or psychological harm, or when the fetus is judged
by competent medical opinion as severely defective.
While the CJLS has taken an explicit stand concerning the permissibility of abortion, it
has been equally clear that this decision should be undertaken with great seriousness and
in consultation with family, clergy and other helping professionals.

The Presbyterian Church
Reverend Applegate, a Presbyterian minister, is former director of Concerned Clergy for Choice of Family
Planning Advocates of New York State.
For Presbyterians, living in a covenant relationship with God is the foundation of who we
are and what we believe. Living in covenant means accepting responsibilities even as we
enjoy God’s good gifts and benefits in our lives. Among these responsibilities are
choosing to live as responsible stewards of God’s creation, exercising our conscience as
moral decision-makers and being advocates for the poor and disenfranchised in our
world. It is out of this understanding that we approach reproductive issues.
In covenant, God gives us the ability to make authentic decisions within a context of
stewardship and responsibility. In our reproductive life as men and women, this first of
all means doing all that we can to prevent unwanted pregnancies, which includes not only
contraceptives and reliable sex education being widely available, but also includes
addressing circumstances and attitudes in our society that lead to unwanted pregnancies.
From working with youth at risk to confronting domestic violence and rape, we all have a
part to play in prevention.
If a woman is pregnant, we recognize and affirm how difficult it is to decide whether to

continue with the pregnancy or not. We will support her and her partner in whatever
choice is made as they are guided by Scripture and the Holy Spirit. We also affirm that a
woman is a capable moral decision-maker. While we encourage involvement of all who
are a part of her life—family, partner, clergyperson, doctor, friends—we recognize that
the ultimate decision is hers.
As Presbyterians, we recognize that in making the choice whether or not to continue the
pregnancy there are many factors that make up a responsible decision: the magnitude of
the commitment of parenting; limited resources of all kinds including human, emotional
and material; and health concerns. No one is able to make such a decision for another
person. “God alone is Lord of the conscience,” is a foundational statement for
Presbyterians; each individual must make his or her choices before God. The faith
community can support, counsel and advise, but ultimately, this is a decision between the
woman and God.
In order for such a choice to be genuine, there must be adequate access to services for all
people, not just those with the means to obtain them. We have committed ourselves to
ensuring access, rejecting violence and intimidation at places where services are provided
and working against those who would assault such choices legislatively.
In the end, Presbyterians believe that as beings created in God’s image and as people who
live in covenant with God, we have a responsibility to determine when and how we will

be partners with God in creating new life. It is a sacred responsibility and trust we have
been given, one we cannot take lightly or without due concern for one another.

Reform Judaism
Rabbi Rosalind A. Gold
Rabbi Gold is spiritual leader of the Northern Virginia Hebrew Congregation in Reston and the
representative of the Central Conference of American Rabbis on the Religious Coalition Council of
Governors.
Reform Judaism reveres and sanctifies human life. We believe that our tradition supports
a woman’s right to choose; we believe that every child has the right to be wanted and
loved; we believe that women must be free from “the whims of biological roulette;” and
we believe strongly that no one religious or political group has the right to impose its
views on others.
For all these reasons, Reform Judaism supports choice. Jewish Law (Halacha) says quite
clearly that if the continued viability of the fetus threatens the mother’s life, abortion is
more than permitted—it is mandated. Up to the time that the fetus is nearly emerged from
the womb, abortion may be done to save the life or health of the mother (Mishnah Oholot
7:6). Rabbinic authorities extend this compassionate approach for the mental health of the
mother as well. If a woman asserts that her continued pregnancy will give her terrible
mental anguish (if, for instance, the pregnancy were the result of a rape), most rabbis of
all denominations would permit abortion.
We find in the Book of Exodus clear indication that the life of a fetus is not granted the
same legal status as a person (Chapter 21:22-23), for if a man pushes a pregnant woman
and she then miscarries, he is required only to pay a fine. If the fetus were considered a
full person, he would be punished more severely as though he had taken a life.
Based on these biblical and rabbinic sources, Reform Judaism opposes efforts to restrict
the right to choose. And just as our community would not impose our religious views on
anyone else (forcing a woman to have an abortion if her own life were at risk, for
instance), we reject other religious traditions which insist that theirs is the only ethical
and moral way to deal with the abortion issues. We believe that a decision concerning a
pregnancy must be made by a woman, in consultation with her family and her physician.
All life is sacred; a woman’s right to choose is sacred, too.

Catholics for a Free Choice
Frances Kissling
Frances Kissling is President of Catholics for a Free Choice, a member organization of the Religious
There is much in the Catholic tradition that supports the pro-choice position. There is a
mistaken belief that the Catholic church has spoken definitively and unchangingly on
abortion. However, a careful reading of church documents shows that while the
prohibition of abortion is a serious teaching, room remains for Catholics to support the
legalization of abortion and even its morality in a wide range of circumstances. And an
examination of core principles of Catholic theology reveals a tradition that respects the
capacity of individuals to make moral decisions.
In the case of legality, a Catholic can point to no less an authority than Thomas Aquinas,
who held that it was not necessary for the church to seek laws that conform to all its
moral teachings. Aquinas points out that where a law against an evil is not likely to be
enforced, greater evil would ensue if it were passed—the overall disrespect for authority
that occurs when laws are not enforced. Moreover, at the second Vatican Council the
church accepted the principle that laws must not prevent people of other faiths from
practicing their faith. Since many religions support a woman’s right to choose, laws
against abortion would violate their rights.
Yet the church continues to turn a blind eye to its own texts and history in insisting that
its current position on abortion leaves no room for dissent or individual choice. For
example, why when Catholic teaching gives primacy to conscience, does the church insist
that there is no room for personal decision-making on the abortion question? A deep
regard for individual conscience is at the heart of church teaching on moral matters. The
church teaches that Catholics must always obey their consciences, even when in conflict
with church teaching. And the little-known but well-respected Catholic moral principle of
“probablism” holds that if an individual can point to respectable theological sources
within the church to support an action or belief currently “forbidden,” that person may
choose that line of action with impunity.
Secondly, how can the Catholic church say there is no room for dissent on the issue of
abortion when the official teaching forbidding abortions has never been proclaimed
infallibly? In the most recent papal encyclical, which deals extensively and forebodingly
with abortion, references to the teaching against abortion as infallible were removed from
the final text because the teaching does not meet the traditional tests for infallibility. One
shortfall is the absence of a definitive teaching or factual way to determine at what point
a fetus becomes a person. And infallibility requires a consistent church position on the
teaching, while the church has favored varying opinions regarding the moment of
personhood throughout history.

And finally, there is the very different way the church has dealt with “life” when men are
the decision-makers rather than women. The church has historically trusted men to make
the decision about when to take life in war by giving them the “just war” theory. There is
no “just abortion” theory for women. Catholics who believe in justice and equality
reluctantly conclude that the absolute opposition of the church to abortion has more to do
with the inequality of women in the church than with respect for life. A commitment to
equality between men and women means that women’s consciences and moral agency
must be respected as much as men’s.

Society for Humanistic Judaism
Rabbi Sherwin T. Wine
Humanistic Judaism was organized by Rabbi Wine, who founded its first congregation, the
Birmingham Temple, in Farmington Hills, Michigan. In 1969, Rabbi Wine helped to found the
Society of Humanistic Judaism.
Humanistic Judaism affirms the right of every human being to be the master of his/her
life. Dignity is a primary value.
Every person has the right to be the master of his/her sexual and reproductive life. The
only limitation on choice should be the welfare of other people and the welfare of the
community. No choice may harm others or prevent positive benefits that would
strengthen the community.
Men and women have the right to choose co-habitation without marriage. They have the
right to choose either a heterosexual or homosexual lifestyle. Women have the right to
choose abortion. None of these choices harms others. The death of a fetus is not the death
of a person.
Of course, there are no absolute rights. The morality of any choice is determined by the
consequences of that choice. Sexual and reproductive freedom must be responsible to
social good. But individual freedom ought not to be restrained unless there are
compelling reasons.

Prayerfully

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Prayerfully Pro-Choice:

Resources for Worship

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 1

As the only national interfaith organization dedicated to preserving reproductive choice,

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 2

In Prayerfully Pro-Choice: Resources for Worship, the Religious Coalition for

On the recommendation of clergy and others, we have published Prayerfully Pro-Choice

Reverend Carlton W. Veazey

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 3

The Unfinished Revolution of Pro-Choice................................................................................................. 7

Faithful Witness for Choice ..................................................................................................................... 27

Faithful Witness for Choice!.................................................................................................................... 61

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 4

You Are Not Alone: Seeking Wisdom to Decide ...................................................................................... 81

Special Events .............................................................................................................................................. 93

Family Life Education: Remarks to the State Legislature ....................................................................... 94

Unitarian Universalism ......................................................................................................................... 104

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 5

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 1

We are made in your image.

In time your care will bring us to perfection.

Our life brings hard choices; we long for the light.

Always we are guided by your sovereign power.

We renew our strength.

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 2

Heather Jo McVoy is a writer and consultant in Tallahassee, Florida.

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 3

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 4

Rosemary Radford Ruether is Professor of Applied Theology at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 5

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 6

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 7

“Right to life” is such a simple slogan. It seems so indisputable, such an unarguable

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 8

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 9

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 10

Acknowledging fetal life as valuable and as an important factor in

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 11

Because of neonatal advances, there is a further question of removing unwanted fetuses

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 12

Another question we need to be wrestling with—those of us on both sides of the issue of

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 13

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 14

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 15

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 16

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 17

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 18

Here, on the pulse of this new day,

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 19

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 20

Scripture makes no explicit mention of induced abortion, whether in approval or

Scripture abounds with references to childbearing; in fact in Hebrew Scripture,

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 21

So why, if there is no direct reference to abortion in Scripture, is Scripture so often quoted

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 22

Re-mything Our Traditions

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice 23

Do we really trust women to make the “hard” choices? Are we willing to

I close my remarks with the voices of women:

From the Episcopal Women’s Caucus (1978):

We believe that all should be free to exercise their own consciences on

From a woman delivering her first child:

It was all so different than I had imagined. Bright lights, machines