A CALL TO JUSTICE! Response Form

OPPOSE HOUSE BILL 228, A TOTAL BAN ON ABORTION, BY WRITING YOUR LETTER NOW!

On June 13, the Ohio House Health Committee held a hearing on House Bill 228. Two clergy, a rabbi and a Christian minister, testified against it, citing religious and moral objections.

      If passed, H.B. 228 would create a total ban on abortion, without any exceptions, not even to save the life of a woman, to protect her health, or in the event of rape or incest.

      This bill would even make a felon of a woman who self-aborts, because the existing law specifically includes self-abortion in the definition of abortion.

       This egregious bill goes even further than the South Dakota law by banning all abortions, and criminalizing anyone--a family member, friend, or clergyperson--who facilitates an abortion by transporting a woman, or causing her to be transported, across a county or state line to an abortion.  

       Both performing or facilitating an abortion are second degree felonies under this bill, and can result in civil lawsuits as well in which money damages can be demanded and won.

       If passed, sponsors of H.B. 228 intend to use it to overturn Roe v. Wade.  (Note: As of May 31, South Dakota's ban was subject to a public referendum and may never reach the Supreme Court.)

House Bill 228 can still be passed by the Ohio legislature before the end of this term!  If a Democratic governor is elected, they may attach it as an amendment to "must pass" legislation.

YOU CAN DO SOMETHING AND IT WON’T TAKE YOU LONG!

How long did you take to prepare for and attend the March on Women's Lives? Hours, days?! In only 20 minutes you can be even more effective at stopping the influence of the religious right on the Ohio legislature.  Here's how!

Send your religious pro-choice letter to the Ohio House Health Committee opposing the ban.   

      Members of FOCO--Freedom of Choice Ohio—the statewide pro-choice coalition, including Planned Parenthood, NARAL, and League of Women Voters, are eager to have religious pro-choice people send letters to the Committee to dispel the view among legislators and the public that all religious people are against abortion and contraception, and don’t respect women as moral agents.

ACT NOW!  YOUR LETTER AS A RELIGIOUS PRO-CHOICE PERSON CAN BE VERY EFFECTIVE! 

       Step 1. Write your letter and save it on your computer, a disk, or cd.  You can find a sample letter below if you are an Episcopalian, Methodist, Presbyterian, Unitarian Universalist, or a member of the United Church of Christ, Reform or Conservative Judaism, or a pro-choice Catholic.  (For Catholics, the statement is from Catholics for Free Choice) The sample letter has excerpts from your national pro-choice statement and a space for you to fill in your opinion and describe your own experience or that of a friend.  Use the sample letter or modify it, or write your own. 

      Step 2.  Email your letter to us at ohiorcrc@sbcglobal.net.  We will make 30 copies and take it to the Chair's office at the State House for distribution to the members of the House Health Committee.

     Step. 3. Email your letter to the Ohio House Health Committee Chair, Rep. John White, at district38@ohr.state.oh.us.  However, don't email it to Rep. White only! If you want to be sure that it goes to the whole committee, email it to us as well as in Step 2.

Sample letters: We have created sample letters that you must carefully read and fill in with your contact information and your own personal experiences or observations. Feel free to modify the text to suit yourself.  On the second page of the sample letter is an excerpt from We Affirm, an RCRC publication with excerpts from RCRC members’ organizational statements.  You may keep or omit this excerpt as part of your letter.

Click on the denomination or faith group of your choice below:

Sample letter from member of the Episcopal Church
Sample letter from member of the Presbyterian Church (USA)
Sample letter from member of the United Methodist Church
Sample letter from member of the Unitarian Universalist Church
Sample letter from member of the Catholic Church—a pro-choice Catholic
Sample letter from member of the United Church of Christ
Sample letter from member of Conservative Judaism
Sample letter from member of Reform Judaism

Suggestions for your letters to the Committee:

1. Support legal, safe abortion.  Write about abortions--your own, or a relative's or friend's of which you have first hand knowledge, and state the reasons you think abortion should remain safe and legal.  Here are some types of abortion:

• Pre-Roe abortions--either by a physician, a non-physician, or self-induced
• Abortion obtained because of rape or incest
• Abortion obtained because of fetal abnormalities
• Abortion obtained because of a threat to life of a woman
• Abortion obtained because of a threat to the health of a woman
• Abortion obtained because financial circumstances made it impossible to carry the pregnancy to term
• Abortion obtained because a woman would be ostracized by her community
• Abortion obtained by another person, but which you facilitated--by driving them, going along as a friend, or providing financial support
• Abortion obtained after you received counseling or advice from a member of the clergy or your family, a professional therapist, or a friend

2. Make clear that you are religious and pro-choice, or not religious and pro-choice. Each of you has a religious--or non-religious--pro-choice view that conflicts with the religious views of those who initiated this bill and who are trying to impose it on you through law.  Members of the Health Committee need to hear from pro-choice

laypersons who oppose HB 228 on religious and/or moral grounds. (See www.rcrc.org, at Issues, for the publication We Affirm, if you want to see other denominations’ and faith groups’ pro-choice statements.)

3. Support “Prevention First,” a bill that includes measures to reduce unintended pregnancy and thereby decrease the number of abortions.  Increasing family planning funds from the state to their former level (and above); making Emergency contraception, Plan B, more accessible at pharmacies; requiring insurance coverage for contraceptives, and assuring that youth receive medically accurate, comprehensive sex education.

Call Barb Avery, Director of Ohio RCRC, if you have any questions at 614-221-3636, or, if outside Central Ohio, at 1-800-587-2330.

Thank you for your support of women and men who wish to exercise their religious beliefs without government interference!

PLEASE, SWAMP US WITH YOUR LETTERS!!!  THANKS!

Written Testimony

TESTIMONY BEFORE THE

OHIO HOUSE HEALTH COMMITTEE

IN OPPOSITION TO HOUSE BILL 228

To: Ohio House Health Committee

c/o  Rep. John White, Chair

June 13, 2006

Rev. Lois M. Powell

United Church of Christ

Cleveland, Ohio

216-736-3715

powelll@ucc.org

              Chairperson White and members of the House Health Committee, thank you for this opportunity to testify in opposition to House Bill 228.  My name is Lois Powell and I am an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ which has more than 400 local congregations in the state of Ohio and over 118,000 members.  Since 1969, the United Church of Christ has supported women’s access to safe and legal abortion.

              One of the reasons we have done so is because we take seriously the establishment clause of the United States Constitution.  We live in a religiously pluralistic nation and state and among religious groups who have thought through this issue carefully and have done so in the context of upholding the sacredness of life, no consensus exists on the issue of the morality of abortion or on when human personhood begins.  House Bill 228 would interfere with the religious liberties of faith groups who understand that the decision to terminate a pregnancy can be a sound moral decision, one which is consistent with one’s faith and values.

              I am also the Chairperson of the Board of Directors for the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice which is comprised of 40 faith-based member organizations which, since 1973, represents the majority of Americans who believe that decisions on when and how many children to bring in to the world must be a decision a woman makes in conjunction with her faith, moral values and her God.  The Religious Coalition believes that our pro-choice voice of faith must be heard.

              But I want to tell you a story, which is the most significant reason why I am opposed to this bill.  In 1970, I was a 19 year old Oberlin College student who became pregnant as a result of what I understood many years later to be date rape.  In the days before Roe, courageous clergypersons formed a network to counsel, support, and, if requested, refer women to safe services to terminate unwanted pregnancies.  I was fortunate that the Dean of Students at the college referred me to one such minister at this time.  His counsel was compassionate and thorough.

              He referred me to a clinic in New York City, located in a state that had just made abortion legal, where my first trimester pregnancy was terminated safely and legally.  My mother met me there and offered me her support as well.  I have never regretted this decision.  I have since counseled other women confronted with unplanned or unintended pregnancies, especially when issues of faith, religion and moral values have been troubling for them.  My role is to assist them in making a decision that is right for her.

              House Bill 228 would have made a felon of the Dean of Students who referred me to the minister, and of the minister who offered support to me during a time of personal crisis.  It would have made felons of the students with whom I drove to New York.  Who knows – maybe my mother would have been a felon, too.

              House Bill 228 is wrong for many, many reasons.  Please, we cannot stop providing women in this state the full range of reproductive care they deserve.  Let an ethic of compassion and justice for women of all ages guide your determination – not an ethic of punishment and harm.

              Thank you.