Uplifting Sacred Possibility

Imagine a world where everybody - every body - was treated as truly sacred. Every body, whatever shape, size, expression, ability - was revered as one of the infinite expressions of the Divine.  A reflection of God.  An opportunity to celebrate the holy diversity that makes up our humanity.  

When we witness our shared humanity we are called to care, to defend, protect, and affirm OUR very existence and our inherent worth. In this world, every body is cared for.  Everybody has the ability to make the decisions they need to be safe and whole in their being.  Every body has access to the resources they need to thrive.  Everybody - every body - is held in a truly liberating love.

Unfortunately, we know that the world as it is today does not treat every body as sacred.  Dominant ideas of safety have created inflated police budgets that rob our children of books and our communities of healthcare.  Living outside prescriptive gender binaries can mean losing a job or your life.  Our society isolates disabled people from community and care by denying access to housing, healthcare, and public space.  But ideas alone aren't what is killing us. It is the allegiance to a values system that moves people to violent and deadly action – against their neighbors, their country, and sometimes their own children.  Our society’s dependence on these immoral forces has moved us so far away from our shared humanity - brutalizing sacred bodies in a vicious cycle of exploitation, violence, and death - so that we no longer regard one another as threads woven together in a Divine tapestry.

These attacks on our bodies are attacks on our existence.  They are neither isolated nor unrelated.  We know this because there is a unified strategy and single solution.  Devalue and criminalize our identities and institutionalize our people.  We know the tactics and the institutions - prisons, jails, conversion therapy, conservatorship, detention, surveillance.  These are the many tentacles of the carceral state that are strangling so many of our Beloveds. 

The nature of the attacks on our sacred bodies means that those of us who live at the intersections of multiple marginalized identities face this violence on all aspects of our being.  Within the carceral state - which already disproportionately targets black and brown communities - 40% of the state prison population are people with disabilities. The number is even higher for incarcerated youth.  In just this first month of 2024, at least 322 bills targeted the transgender people, many in states where we have already witnessed the criminalization of reproductive health care.  And among individuals specifically seeking abortions, 1 in 5 must travel out of state for care.  That barrier creates unsurmountable burdens for individuals without the financial, social, or physical means to travel.  As we dream of a world where everybody thrives, we find ourselves fighting to create a world where every body can at least survive.

And yet, it is within this fight where we can remind ourselves that another world is possible, but only if we commit to creating it together.  In the midst of what is, there are glimmers of what could be.  There are holy moments of possibility that we must lean into during these desperate times.  From the quiet moments of self-determination and action, to the power of thousands showing up for collective liberation, there is hope in all of those moments that connect us. 

Our connection isn’t just sacred, it is powerful.  Some of these moments look like gathering together to protest anti-trans laws at the capitol; holding vigils to honor the community members whom we have lost; teaching our youth what rights they have over their own bodies; and growing mutual aid networks that strengthen each others’ access to essential resources and care.  In those moments, where we show up together, our momentum is realized and the loneliness is lessened. 

Changing the world has always happened when the few become the many.  When we each find our common humanity in the strength of our values, we all find new ways to love the hell out of this world! 

Knowing that God lives in the margins, on the edge of all possibility, we are called to engage in the world as it is, grounded in our values and in an all-encompassing LOVE, to turn it into what it could be.  This week we hope you will take time to think about how to build the world of infinite possibility that we dream of, where our bodies, however they are, are expressions of all that is good and sacred in this world.  

Rev. Amanda Schuber, Disability Justice Associate
Rev. Jami Yandle, Trans Support Specialist
Rev. Ranwa Hammamy, Congregational Organizer

See all the resources offered for Week Three of 30 Days of Love 2024

I write to you from my home in Alabama where last fall, I assisted at the first birth in a birth center in our state, and where the state of safer birth is now in jeopardy.

Will you weigh in for reproductive justice in my state?

The Alabama Department of Public Health has proposed a draft of birth center rules and regulations that are discriminatory, outdated, and non-evidence based. These proposed rules and regulations will prohibit many eligible families from being able to afford and access birth centers in any of the proposed (and already operating) birthing centers in the state.

Earlier this week, I was interviewed on our local TV station about our opposition to these new rules.

Alabama has among the highest rates of maternal death and infant death of all states. For women of color, the outcomes are worse. 37% of our counties are maternity care deserts. We need MORE skilled providers serving our communities - not unnecessary restrictions.

Freestanding birth centers staffed with midwives, including Certified Professional Midwives, aren’t a problem; they’re a solution. Birth Centers have demonstrated positive outcomes for pregnant people and their babies.

Our goal at Side With Love is to make sure that Alabama families who desire birth center births, are able to make values-aligned decisions about their birth settings and that those decisions are affordable and accessible to all. This is what bodily autonomy looks like. This is what it means when we say “Every Body is Sacred.”

Will you join me in putting your faith in action in this fight for reproductive equity and justice?

Submit a Public Comment Now

Help us flood the Alabama Department of Health with public comments to ensure that all of Alabama’s families who desire the midwifery model of care in birthing centers are allotted that opportunity.

Thank you for taking action for birth justice.

Charity Howard
Reproductive Justice Organizing Intern
Side With Love

Earlier today, the Supreme Court of the United States handed down its decision in the Dobbs v. Jackson case. The final opinion effectively overturned Roe v. Wade and eliminated federal protections for abortion. Each state will now be able to independently regulate abortion, with at least 26 states poised to entirely ban abortion care beginning immediately. 

We weep for the millions of people and families that will be harmed–physically, spiritually, financially, and emotionally–because of this decision. We mourn that this ruling rolls back many decades of advances for reproductive health, rights, and justice. And we sit with the numbness, despair, and anger we feel knowing that white Christian nationalist misogyny has won the day. 

Whenever our movements experience a major defeat, we take a beat to discern what our next moves will be. We all have the right to grieve, to rage, to mourn when we lose – it’s what keeps us human, and reminds us why we keep fighting. (Sometimes this can look like mass protest, when we gather in the streets as a community together. Many communities are planning decision day #BansOffOurBodies marches or protests; find yours here.)

Then, when we’re ready to move back into action after a loss, we have to choose how to allocate our energy. In the weeks and months ahead, as we calibrate to the realities of living in a post-Roe United States, there will be concrete ways for our congregations to take on both harm reduction and liberatory imagination. Here are three things you can do right now to support both today:

• Donate to your local abortion fund, and/or the National Network of Abortion Funds. Abortion has never been universally accessible to people in the US, but the National Network of Abortion Funds and their local affiliates have been supporting those seeking abortion care for decades. From making clinic referrals to providing financial support for medical costs, travel, childcare, and more, we need robust abortion funds more than ever. 

• Make a plan to host a(nother) Reproductive Justice Sunday in your congregation. Worship can be both a way of ministering to people’s hearts, and a component in mobilizing our communities for action. Click the link above to see the rich compendium of resources you can use for services in your congregation. 

• Join Side With Love’s UPLIFT Action campaign for our upcoming three-part Reproductive Justice Congregational Organizing series. In congregational cohorts and a large group, we will explore the role of congregations in a post-Roe world (Session 1), spend time discerning risk and accessing courage (Session 2), and make an organizing plan (Session 3). 

Whether you are in a state where abortion will be criminalized, or a state to which people will come seeking abortion care, there is a role for all of us–and all our congregations–to play, starting right now. The fight is far from over, but we’re grateful to be in it for the long haul with you.

In faith and solidarity,

The Side With Love Team 

On May 17th, Side With Love hosted the National Network of Abortion Funds for a political education webinar for Unitarian Universalists and other people of faith and conscience to support abortion and take action in a post-Roe world. We’re especially grateful to Amanda Pretlow and Adaku Utah for their expertise, love, and invitational challenge at this event.

• View the webinar

• View the presentation

We heard about the importance of strengthening our muscles to have deep, connective conversations with people in our communities about abortion (and other issues!). NNAF’s Heart-to-Heart framework is an incredible resource to use for both relational organizing (1:1 values-based conversations with people in our own networks) and community organizing (within our congregations and with other faith communities). You can check out the whole array of Heart-to-Heart resources on the NNAF website, or you can jump right to specific tools:

• Heart-to-Heart toolkits: small group and individual

• Heart-to-Heart placemat and menu

• Heart-to-Heart virtual card selector

• The #AbortionWithinReach Campaign demands & resources

Toward the end of the webinar, we offered three specific calls to action:

1. Become an individual member of NNAF, and organize your congregation to make an offering to your local abortion fund.

2. Plan a set of small-group Heart-to-Heart conversations either within your own congregation, or in partnership with other local progressive congregations – remember that the work of building alignment, shared values, and relationships is an essential precursor to building power and capacity!

3. If your congregation is ready to begin organizing right now for concrete action working for abortion access and reproductive justice in your community, join us for Side With Love’s three-session Congregational Reproductive Justice Organizing Series, happening later this summer! (Please note that in order to join this cohort, we require at least two people from your congregation to commit to participating).

We’re so grateful that so many UUs are ready to meet the needs of this moment, and to continue to grow our relationships with organizations who have been leading this struggle for years.

Blessings,

Rev. Ashley Horan

Organizing Strategy Director, Side With Love - UUA

Since well before Roe v. Wade, Unitarian Universalists have declared unequivocally that we support every person’s right to make decisions about their own bodies and reproductive health, including the choice to seek abortion care. Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, UUs have supported movements working to make abortion accessible and affordable and to destigmatize abortion within our society. Given that legacy, today is a heartbreaking day for all of us who believe that our bodies, and the choices we make about them, are sacred. 

Yesterday afternoon, Politico broke the news that through an unprecedented breach in Supreme Court security, they had obtained an early draft of the SCOTUS majority opinion in Dobbs v Jackson–a case in which the Court’s new conservative supermajority has the opportunity to overturn Roe and revert the country to an era in which abortion rights are determined on a state-by-state basis. In the leaked draft opinion, Justice Alito speaks for the majority in declaring, “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start,” and goes on, “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled.” In effect, unless the final version of this ruling is dramatically different than this draft, abortion will no longer be a federally protected right, with “trigger laws” criminalizing abortion care going into effect immediately.

To be clear: The conservative supermajority–enabled by a majority of justices appointed by Presidents that did not win the popular vote–is suggesting they will renege on their confirmation reassurances that Roe was the settled law of the land. Should this decision be finalized, it will be an intentional choice to side with white supremacy and Christian nationalism, and it will be an attack on all people with uteruses, particularly and especially BIPOC, poor, rural, and disabled people. It will have immediate and deadly consequences for millions of people. 

And still: pregnant people have been seeking and providing abortion care for hundreds and thousands of years. As so many have said, banning abortion will simply make it more difficult for people–especially poor, rural, and BIPOC people–to obtain surgical abortions safely and legally. To those of you who are in need of an abortion: your fear is valid, your body is sacred, and a wide network of people who acknowledge these truths are ready to help you access the abortion care you need. And, abortion is still legal right now. To get connected with medical providers and logistical and financial support, go to ineedana.com or abortionfinder.org to find the clinic nearest you.

The truth is that the conversation about abortion and reproductive rights has always been about Christian nationalism, misogyny, and white supremacy. Under the guises of “religious liberty” and “states’ rights,” the white, owning-class Christian right has been working since the end of the Civil War to subjugate and criminalize Black and brown bodies, maintain power, and hoard wealth. In the post-Roe era, with the rise of the Evangelical right, politicians quickly discovered that abortion was a highly motivating electoral issue to their base, and have been waging culture wars ever since. Meanwhile, the Christian right has ensured that unless you are urban, white, and middle class, you likely face significant barriers to obtaining an abortion even if it is technically legal.

For those of us who have poured our hearts into Reproductive Justice work, the likely overruling of Roe is heartbreaking. Many of us are terrified not only of what this will mean for people seeking abortions and other reproductive care, but for the precedent this ruling could set for bodily autonomy and privacy in countless other arenas. 

Our Unitarian Universalist faith affirms that all of our bodies are sacred, and that we are each endowed with the twin gifts of agency and conscience. Each of us should have the power to decide what does and doesn’t happen to our bodies at every moment of our lives because consent and bodily autonomy are holy. And when disparities in resources or freedoms make it more difficult for certain groups of people to exercise autonomy over their own bodies, our faith compels us to take liberatory action. 

As a people of faith, Unitarian Universalists have committed to working together for Reproductive Justice, following the lead of movement partners who have been in the struggle and on the frontlines for years. Here are six things you can do today to take action:  

1. Turn out tonight wherever you are to answer the Women’s March’s call to Rally for Roe.

2. Join Side With Love and the National Network of Abortion Funds for our upcoming political education event, Heart-to-Heart: Abortion Conversations & Action for a Post-Roe World, Tuesday, May 17 at 8pm ET/5pm PT.

3. Support local organizing for abortion access and Reproductive Justice. Form a congregational team, educate yourselves, join with other progressive people of faith, follow the lead of your local Reproductive Justice organization.

4. Donate to your local abortion fund to ensure that everyone who needs an abortion can afford one.

5. Get involved with SACReD, the Spiritual Alliance of Communities for Reproductive Dignity, which is building a multi-racial, multi-faith movement of congregations across the country that publicly proclaim their support for reproductive dignity. It’s so new that it doesn’t have a full website, but you can sign up for future communications here.

6. Get involved with the work of the Liberate Abortion Coalition, and consider participating in the upcoming Abortion Crisis Caravan this June.

The fight is far from over, beloveds. Every popular poll shows that the overwhelming majority of Americans support the right to safe and legal abortion, and the Reproductive Justice movement is powerful and mobilized. As Renee Bracey Sherman, Executive Director of We Testify, recently noted, “Abortion is not a divisive issue, it’s a gerrymandered issue.” So we take a deep breath together, and prepare to carry on the work of those who have gone before and to follow those already leading us into the future. In the words of SisterSong, “ABORTION IS STILL LEGAL and we will always fight to keep it that way, but our work and our liberation has always been bigger than laws. It is also about culture change and mutual aid and US SHOWING UP FOR US.”

 Blessings and love to all as we show up together.

In faith and solidarity,

The Side With Love Team