Women’s Healthcare

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1. Eighteen states now ban most, if not all abortions affecting more than 1 in 3 American Women ages 26 to 45. Wash Post analysis

2. Criminality increases mortality and health complications caused by unsafe abortions. 68,000 women die annually and is becoming the leading cause of death in mothers. 13%. Source: OBGYN Review, Spring 2009-ncbi.nim.nih.gov

3. Demographics: Abortion statistics: 24% identify as catholic, 13% as evangelical,. 17% as mainline protestant. Contraception Statistics is the same accross religions: 95-99.9% as follows: Catholics:25% sterilization, 15% reversibles like IUD, 25% hormonal birth control. Guttmacher 2014, published 2020.

4. 79% are married, 51% have 2 or more children, 50% have education of 7 yrs or more, 63% are between ages of 20 and 34 Women have a average of 1.2 abortions during their reproductive years. Allan Guttmacher Institute 2024

5. Womens abilty to control their fertility has resulted in improved economic wellbeing and advancement. It has allowed them to participate in the labor force leading to increased wages, educational outcomes, reduced teen and young adult motherhood, improved health outcomes and preventable deaths of both mother and child. Sources: J. Gruber, Quarterly Journal of Economics. Www.nber.org/papers/w6034 and K. Gerdts and others, “Women’s Health Issues 26, (2015), https/pubmed/ncbi.nim.nih.gov/26576470

6. Catholic Theological Background: St Thomas Aquinas states that Concience is the Key to Catholicism. He links it to a rational mind, not a feeling or a thought. He states that we must use reason when making a moral decision and that an individual has the right to act in conscience and in freedom to make personal moral decisionss. Conscience is a binding force whether true or erroneous. Conscience is the voice of God within the individual and must be listened to. Christianity and the Last of Conscience, Ch. 6. pp 112-131. Cambridge University Press 6/12/2021 - https:/doi.org-

7. 2/3 of catholics (68%) did not want Roe reversed, 56% favor legalization, 10% believe it whould be illegal in all cases. Pew Research.org , 2019- Updated 2024

8. Other: Full abortion ban is codified by the Vatican in 1917. Prior to 1880’s it was mostly accepted before “quickening” and was considered “restoration of menses”.

9. Abortion is not banned, shamed or discouraged in the Bible.

 

TALKING POINTS

 

1. Women deserve the Right to their Reproductive Freedom in an egalitarian society.

2. Criminalizing abortion violates fundamental human rights of women and girls and validates a clandestine market that pofits at the cost of womenbody autonomy.

3. Lack of access to safe abortions in complicated pregnancies lead to increased mortality and health complications by both direct and indirect causes.The separation of churc

4. Public Opinion accross all adults (70%) support legal access to abortion. (68% of catholics)

5. Not all faiths have the same directives regarding pregnancy and allows citizens to practice the religion of their choice. First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion." Known as the establishment clause, the opening lines of the First Amendment prohibit the government from creating an official religion or favoring one religion (or nonreligion) over another.

6. The separation of church and state enables all Americans to practice their deeply held beliefs in private and in public

7. Lack of access will disproportionally impact poor and younger women and will not discourage abortions.

8. Clear Disinformation that has muddled the facts, for example: allowing termination at 9 months, or even “at birth” (technically infanticide). Also, that abortion will be used for contraception. (As possibly in other countries)