Personhood by Rev. Dr. Linda Olson Peebles, Jan. 22, 2012

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“Personhood”

by Rev. Dr. Linda Olson Peebles, Jan. 22, 2012

Readings
Today, January 22, is the 39^thanniversary of the Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, the decision that upheld the right of a woman to privacy in deciding whether to continue a pregnancy. This decision was pivotal, making possible access to safe and legal medical care for all women. Barry Lynn, a minister in the United Church of Christ, the director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, wrote:

I hailed the ruling in Roe v. Wade when it was handed down in 1973 and still support it today. But in hindsight, there was one element missing from that landmark decision: A frank declaration that attempts to deny women reproductive freedom are grounded in religious dogma and that this raises serious concerns in a nation that separates church and state.

The ink on the Roe decision wasn't even dry before it came under sustained political attack by the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church and fundamentalist Protestant clergy. We were told that legal abortion violated papal dictates or some right-wing minister's interpretation of the Bible. That may be true for the respective believers, but it should never become the grounds for denying access to a medical procedure in America.

In 1989, the Supreme Court upheld a Missouri law that restricted abortion and declared that "the life of each human being begins at conception." At the time, Americans United pointed out that the law was drafted by the Missouri Catholic Conference. In a friend-of-the-court brief, we insisted that this is a theological view that has no business being written into secular law. Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens agreed with us. He noted "the absence of any secular purpose for the legislative declarations that life begins at conception and that conception occurs at fertilization" and called the Missouri law "an unequivocal endorsement of a religious tenet of some but by no means all Christian faiths." Unfortunately, Stevens' colleagues did not subscribe to this view.

The high court's failure to take this issue seriously has brought us to where we are today. Politicians acting at the behest of ultra-conservative religious bodies are whittling away at women's right to make personal choices. Congress is even considering cutting off funding for Planned Parenthood, a respected organization that provides essential reproductive services across America.

This struggle is really nothing more than an attempt by some religious groups to use the power of the government to impose their dogma about reproduction, sexuality and the beginnings of life. It is way past time for judges and elected officials to start respecting the wall of separation between church and state.

Over the decades, the UUA has debated and passed a dozen resolutions speaking about how we understand our faith's calling on the issue of reproductive justice. Summaries can be found at www.uua.org, including these words:

The Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) recognizes that issues pertaining to reproduction—whether it be access to contraception, abortion, and comprehensive sex education or social/legal recognition of what constitutes a family—all have profound social justice implications. Who gets access to the information and resources that they need to help determine their own lives and who does not? The answer to that question affects the social and economic conditions of all involved. Therefore, the UUA promotes comprehensive sex education and reproductive choice from the lens of reproductive justice.

Unitarian Universalists have a historic commitment to working for women's rights and reproductive health. Our faith affirms the inherent worth and dignity of every person, the right of individual conscience in decision-making, and respect for human life. We recognize that the struggle for safe and legal access to abortion services is one arena within the larger framework of reproductive justice for which we strive.

Reproductive justice means that all women have the human right to bear—or not bear—children when and how they choose to do so.

This includes, but is not limited to: access to safe, legal and affordable health care, comprehensive sex education, nutrition, parent support, family planning, contraception, abortion, and adoption, particularly for low-income women; bisexual, gay, lesbian, and transgender people; and women and families of color. These people are disproportionately and systematically denied their right to crucial services and the full array of reproductive choices and self-determination over their bodies.

We are called by our values to uphold the rights of women and their families through legislative action and advocacy. As Unitarian Universalists, we enact our values and beliefs by becoming knowledgeable and effective advocates for justice and equality. We invite you to join in our commitment.

Sermon: Personhood

Every time I feel the spirit – I must pray. When I hold a precious baby – I pray. When I watch a 13-year-old struggle to find their autonomy, I pray. When I sit with an elder, breathing lasts breaths, and releasing their attachment to this life, I pray.

Today I have chosen to speak on a subject which is a very complex one. I know in this room there are many experiences and opinions about life and rights and when is a person a person. I know in this room there are people who have had abortions, those who have supported women choosing abortions, those who oppose abortions, and those who keep changing their mind because this is such a complex issue. I know there are those who have had to make difficult end-of-life choices, and those who have struggled with choices about raising children and caring for family members with differing abilities. We walk together on holy ground when we join our lives together, and ponder – who is a person? And how can we respect and honor the worth and dignity of all persons?

Many words have been used to argue the logic, the reason, the science of this question – who is a person? Who gets to say what a person does with their life? Please forgive me if I speak unclearly, or if I offend, if I leave out your story, or if I don't include everything that scientists, activists, constitutional lawyers, and religionists have to say about this.

But I risk treading on thin ice, and I invite you to join me on this thin ice, because I believe deeply that liberal people of faith must find ways to join the public conversation on the subject of personhood, of life, of love. One of our church members, who is involved with our UUs for Reproductive Justice, told me, “Why am I so vocal now? I don't really believe that standing in the middle of an anti-choice protest with my pro-choice sign is going to change the minds of those around me… I do it because the anti-choice side is so very LOUD these days... and I think that we need to show the general public that the pro-choice side is THERE... that we aren't allowing the anti-choice side to do all the speaking. I do it, too, because I feel like it strengthens me, standing up publicly for what I believe.”

Something strange is going on right now. The very basic idea of who is a person is being threatened. Some want to say a “person” is even the potential for being a person – a collection of cells which have been brought together. And others say (as the Supreme Court ruled two years ago this week in the “Citizens United” decision) that a “person” can include an entity that is incorporated – not an individual at all, but an institution.

What is going on? What is behind this strange re- invention of “personhood”? This very abstract dialogue feels pretty crazy. And I try not to be sucked into “crazy.” I have left abstract arguments of heaven and hell to those who want to obsess about them. What is beyond my knowing is held in the arms of the great mystery – and I am fine with that! I leave to God the question of my soul before I was born and after I die. What makes sense to me is that “persons” are those who live and move and breathe on this planet earth now! And my faith, what centers me and seems sane, is to focus on the inclusion of all who dwell right here right now – regardless of gender or race or class or mental or physical ability or age or sexual orientation. THESE are the persons I believe are in the family.

I’m very suspicious about these new ideas of personhood. It's almost as if there is a movement that wants to take power away from individuals – those whose personhood threatens somebody. Who gains from granting personhood to a zygote over a women; or to a Super PAC at the expense of a young individual entering the political process? Who benefits from these new definitions? Not me! Not my children! Not my neighbors. Not the REAL persons with whom I feel an accountable relationship.

This crazy-making attempt to define personhood, that takes us away from the reality of real life, real love, real relationship – this has been going on throughout history. Societies around the world have assigned different levels of personhood and personal rights, usually to screen power-mongering. In this nation during the last four hundred years, we have seen many changes. Over time, we have debated the humanity and personhood of women, of children, of people without land, of indigenous people, of people from Africa, of people indentured to other people, of people who had been imprisoned, of people whose heritage was from a country we were at war with, of people who were bi, gay, lesbian, transgendered.

The list is extensive of people whose personhood was proscribed, lessened, or denied by society. Over the centuries, how often those in power tried to limit who could describe which people were entitled to the “divine rights” spoken of in our Declaration of Independence. And, at the same time, the history of our nation is a history of recognizing, all too slowly, the FULL humanity of all persons – blacks, immigrants, women, children, BGLT persons, persons of differing abilities.

I believe that the Arc of the Universe, ever bending toward justice, should not now be bent backwards, to lessen a woman's personhood, to avert us from focusing on the personhood of folks whose rights have been denied!

The arguments from those on the right who want to deny a woman full personhood, to close clinics providing abortions, to restrict contraception, to control access to education and affordable health care – the arguments offered by them claim that they care about saving babies' lives. But how can that be? Around the world, the lowest rates of abortions are in nations where women have full access to education, healthcare, and support. Contrast that with the laws popping up all over the US – that would criminalize women and their doctors for hurting that zygote in any way. So doctors could be put in jail for ending an ectopic pregnancy; women would be criminals for using certain kinds of contraception. Or even for having a miscarriage if it was determined that in some way her carelessness, like falling down stairs, caused the miscarriage! So far, most of the bills have been defeated – but the effort to grant personhood to zygotes is not going away. Indeed, in our very own state of Virginia, legislation has been introduced this very session to grant full personhood to the cells at the moment of fertilization.

I do not want to argue against anyone's faith stance. But elements of our liberal religious theology do offer us an insight into a faithful stance for us.

1. Choice- People have the right and responsibility to make choices and answers questions in ways that their reason and their sense of truth led them. It is why Unitarians were called heretics from the 1500s onward wherever we entered the societal conversation. Heresy is a word from the Greek which means “Choice”!
2. Freedom - We believe in unfolding truth, deepening understanding, the active dynamic of how the divine is revealed and perceived. People should have freedom of mind as well as body in determining belief, meaning, practice.
3. Mystery –Mystery that holds me, that allows for all the paradox and ambiguity in this life. I do not know all the answers, there is so much in this cosmos that no human being will ever know, and that is ok – that mystery is what gives me faith.
4. The connection of the whole and the individual. Our lives intersect, influence, and co-create. We find the divine in REAL relationships with one another.

When women are entering a clinic which will give them healthcare, and people of a certain faith stance are yelling at them and calling them baby killers - where should we stand?

Should we buy into the framing of this argument as being pro-life vs. pro-choice? It doesn't make sense to me. I value life, I love life, and I want to protect life – especially for those with few privileges and marginalized and vulnerable. I stand on the side of love for people whose rights have been denied.

Author Jennifer Baumgardner suggests the notion of being “Pro-Voice”. By that she means, being open to and encouraging the multiplicity of reality to; letting people tell their stories, give voice to their pain and joy, and speak of their fears and hopes. And this includes the voices of people on both sides of the street, and everyone in between.

This is my faith stance: there is no one “right” answer to what a woman should do when she is pregnant. But there is the “right” imperative to support a woman in her deepest experience, in her full and complex humanness, so that her personhood is not lessened by another.

Something else: Author and doctor Merle Hoffman reminds us: “Abortion is often portrayed as the cause of social ills. But abortion is the effect of social inequalities” - like hopelessness, poverty, rape - “not the cause.” If we REALLY want to reduce the need for abortion, “we have to commit ourselves to the broadest, most inclusive social justice agenda. We have to care about poor people, gay people, people of color, and we have to be willing to build support networks, education, and respect that can truly have an impact.”

The author Annie Lamott says this: “I am so confused about why we still have to argue with patriarchal sentimentality about miniscule zygotes, when real, live, already born women, many of them desperately poor, get such short shrift from the government now in power. Many women like me would much rather use our time and energy fighting to make the world safe and just and fair for the children we do have and do love.”

The spirit which is within me compels me in this way: to offer support and love to the persons we share our community with now, to offer justice and care. I believe we can be BOTH Pro-Life and Pro-choice! And also my faith is this – give power to those who have been shamed and silenced, ignored and condemned. Be Pro-Voice; insist that the humanity, the personhood of the girls and women is affirmed and supported.

Every time I feel the spirit – I will pray. And I am in good company.

Dr. George Tiller, of Witchita Kansas, who was murdered for his work in providing safe health care to women, said this - “Abortion is not a cerebral or a reproductive issue. Abortion is a matter of the heart... until one understands the heart of a woman, nothing else about abortion makes any sense at all.”

Theologian Frederick Buechner said that we are called to find what breaks our hearts, then find where that heartbreak intersects with the needs of the world, and act on it.

The African American playwright Zora Neale Hurston wrote - “There is no agony like bearing an untold story inside you.” Let the voices be heard, the stories be told! We become more human when we see one another as people with relationships and hearts and lives and experiences. We affirm our personhood, in a way that cannot be taken away from us.

I have never heard so many stories come from you all as when I announced the topic of this sermon. I thank you all for sharing them with me, and I hope you’ll share them with others.

Many of us have been quiet for many decades about the questions raised by the Roe v Wade decision. But our voices need to be heard – our faith witness on the public square, and our votes in the election booth.

Religious people who believe in reproductive rights need to reclaim the moral argument. Rev. Karen Anderson, of the UU Church in Rochester, New York, has proclaimed: “It matters for communities of faith to say: We have values we hold just as strongly as the religious right, and if we talked about it in moral language, we could change the conversation.”

As my heart is broken open - with love for my new granddaughter, with love for the women whose stories need to be told, with love for all who anguish over the meaning of “personhood” - as our hearts break open, let us make LOVE be at the center of our stance, LOVE which encompasses pro-life, pro-choice, pro-voice.

Prayer

Spirit of Life, Source of Love,

We give thanks for the many blessings in our lives: the never-ending beauty, the caring relationships, and the interdependent web of life that holds us.

We give thanks for the miracle and mystery of life and for those who protect women and the personhood of all people.

We give thanks for the intelligence, talent, wit, and wisdom of all the women and girls in our lives.

We pray for women who have struggled with the decision to terminate their pregnancy and for those who support them.

We pray that women know the power of their own stories and that they find their voices and tell their truths.<

We pray for women to throw away their secrets and claim their histories with power and love.

We pray for all discrimination against women to cease and for a contagious love to overflow from our spirits and out into the world.

Within our deepest selves may we find the courage to live life boldly, even in the face of failure and tragedy.

And in beloved community may we bless the world by working hand in hand to heal and give hope to all.

Amen.

[prayer adapted from 40 Days of Prayer to Keep Abortion Safe and Legalby Faith Aloud]

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