Rockville Centre religious leaders offer thoughts after state Democrats pass Reproductive Health Act

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After the Democratically controlled State Assembly and Senate passed the Reproductive Health Act last week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the law, protecting and expanding abortion rights in New York.

Passage came on Jan. 22, the 46th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that ruled in favor of a 21-year-old Texas woman who sought an abortion several years prior, asserting that the right of privacy found in the U.S. Constitution “is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.”

Legislators in Albany had tried to pass the law since 2007. Along with moving abortion statutes out of the penal code and into the state’s health laws, the act allows a licensed, certified or authorized practitioner to perform an abortion within 24 weeks of the start of pregnancy, or afterward if “there is an absence of fetal viability” or to protect a patient’s life or health. It passed the Assembly, 92-47, and the Senate, 38-24, with every Senate Republican voting against it.

“With so much uncertainty and hostility in Washington, we must act now to ensure women’s rights remain protected in New York,” State Sen. Todd Kaminsky, a Democrat from Long Beach, said in a statement. “Today’s package of legislation is a promise kept that our state will not will go backward and will remain a leader in protecting human rights for all.”

Assemblywoman Judy Griffin, a Democrat from Rockville Centre elected last November, had promised to fight for reproductive rights, and co-sponsored the bill in the Assembly, paired with two other bills ensuring access to cost-free contraception and prohibiting discrimination against employees because of reproductive health decisions.

“Preventing a woman from making her own health decisions is unjust, misogynistic and invasive,” Griffin said in a news release. “A woman’s right to determine what’s best for her life and her body has been upheld by the Supreme Court since 1973, and we here in New York will not stand idly by as that right is threatened.”

The bill is the latest chapter in a debate that has persisted for decades. Thousands of anti-abortion demonstrators gathered in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 18 for the annual March For Life, including about 30 buses filled with 700 students from the Diocese of Rockville Centre’s nine Catholic high schools, according to a diocese news release.

In a homily at St. Agnes Cathedral on Jan. 22, Bishop John O. Barres, who leads the Diocese of Rockville Centre, asked parishioners to pray “for the full restoration of the legal guarantee of the right to life,” and “engage in penance for violations to the dignity of the human person committed through acts of abortion.” He also lauded those who marched in Washington.

“It is inspirational to see so many of our young people embrace the Gospel of Life as a key cornerstone and foundation of their philosophy of life,” Barres said. “The hope that Jesus brings them in their Catholic faith is the anchor of their public witness. They express their commitment with great spirit, great poise, great courage and great creativity.”

As the Catholic Church leads the pro-life movement it has pushed for years, other local religious leaders weighed in on the issue. Ray Longwood, lead pastor at Rockville Centre’s Experience Vineyard Church, within a younger denomination of Christianity, said that while the church offers a pro-life message, it does not chastise those who have made that choice.

“We have a lot of people who have had abortions in the past and have walked down that path before . . . and carry shame and carry regret and carry a bunch of the other emotions that come with making a decision on that choice,” Longwood said. “We want to be a place of healing for people who go through that.”

He said he would encourage his congregation to pray, noting that passage of the law allows an opportunity to connect with friends, neighbors and co-workers and share God’s love with them. “When a step is taken to keep the human right more important than the human life, then where are we? That’s kind of the tension I think we’re at with this,” Longwood said. “. . . And so, the difference that we can make maybe isn’t standing in Washington, isn’t necessarily holding up a sign, but it’s actually really loving those around us and giving them another option.”

Rabbi Marc Gruber, of Central Synagogue-Beth Emeth, said that the Jewish perspective on abortion is somewhat different than most denominations of Christianity, noting that, according to Jewish law, a fetus is not considered a full person until birth. Though he noted that the life of the potential person is sacred, the life and health of the mother is always considered first.

Gruber said that some members of his Rockville Centre congregation are pro-life, and that he encourages people of different viewpoints to have respectful conversation to understand one another, even if they fundamentally disagree.

There are “people who aren’t religious who have very sincere, heartfelt, well-reasoned, moral and ethical positions on serious matters, and their positions need to count also,” he added.

The Reproductive Health Act, Gruber said, allows Jewish people to make choices based on their beliefs and allows other women to act differently if they choose. “When it comes up as a matter of counseling, it’s always tragic,” he said about abortion. “No one ever lightly chooses an abortion. This whole silly idea that it’s a means of birth control, I never met a woman where that was the case.”

The law notes that practitioners may only perform an abortion according to their “reasonable and good faith professional judgment based on the facts of the patient’s case.”

“These measures recognize that reproductive rights are human rights,” Griffin said. “This is an enormous victory that gives New York women control over their own health, safety and future.”