May 26- Contra “Clergy for Choice”

Two weeks ago there was a story in these pages headlined “Pro-Choice clergy take to the airwaves” announcing that a group of Jewish and gentile clergy was forming a chapter of Clergy for Choice.

“The clergy group has begun to monitor legislative activity as well [as broadcast its opinions on the air]; in fact, it was formed as a response to a bill passed overwhelmingly last year by the R.I. Senate threatening to eliminate a woman’s right to choose.” I also favor reproductive rights (the right of fetuses to be born) and would have phrased it, “a bill passed overwhelmingly reflecting the will of the people of the state of Rhode Island to eliminate a woman’s right to terminate her pregnancy.”

The Clergy for Choice spokesperson also said that “the Hebrew bible and rabbinic writings support individual choice according to one’s own conscience and religious beliefs.” The do? The Hebrew bible gives women the right to terminate pregnancy according to her conscience and religious beliefs? In a book filled with the joy of mothers who give birth, the agony of the infertile? The Hebrew scriptures I read includes this from Deuteronomy 30:19 “I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life, that you and your descendants may live.” That Hebrew bible? The rabbis? They permit the dismemberment of the fetus at the last moment if the birth is threatening the life of the mother, and yes, there is more recent responsa extending that principle to cover cases affecting the mother’s physical and mental health or in the case of rape and incest, but according to Isaac Klein, in his A Guide to Jewish Religious Practice, “When abortion is desired for reasons of convenience, however, it is forbidden.”

Barbara Kavadias from the national group of clergy for choice skips the text-based rhetoric: “We [Jews] are pro-choice because of our faith. Pro-choice is an individual choice and it is not necessarily pro-abortion. We believe that no one; not pharmacists, not doctors, not hospitals, not the government should be able to impose their religious beliefs on us.” Does Barbara really speak for Jews? Or only for Jews who agree with her? The quotation leaves us to assume that Jews favor the right of mothers to terminate their pregnancies if they are of a mind to. We do? I’m a Jew and I don’t.

By now, most of my friends are appalled. I can hear them even before they collar me at schul, school or supermarket. “Josh, how could you, a liberal, a progressive, an advocate of human rights be pro-life?” (Yeah, yeah, I know, they’ll be smart enough to say “anti-choice” but it’s more fun the way I’ve phrased it.)

In fact, I do believe in choice. I believe that women can choose to have protected or unprotected sex or abstain from sex. I believe that men should choose to take responsibility for their sexual acts. I believe that a woman whose baby to a medical certainty is going to live a short, painful, life may choose to terminate her pregnancy to spare the child inevitable suffering and early death. I believe that a woman raped may legitimately choose to abort. I believe that no one has the right to choose to deny her child the right to smell the scent of fresh cut grass, to hit a home run, to meet and marry someone they love. NOTE: THIS BECAME THIS IN PRINTED ARTICLE.WORDS IN BOLD ADDED BY EDITOR, NOT ME: I believe that no one, not even she, has the right to choose to deny her child the right to smell the scent of fresh cut grass, to hit a home run, to meet and marry someone they love. Advocating state sanctioned abortion announces to the world that we are not responsible for our actions, that actions have no consequences, that do-overs are permitted. Sometimes they are, but never in anything important, never in taking a life.

To answer the question how, if I’m a liberal can I be in the pro-life camp I’m a liberal because there is poverty out there that must be eradicated, because there are workers being exploited, because there are rain forests being cut down and rivers being polluted. Liberals take the side of the underdog, of the voiceless, of black people in the south under segregation, of the Jews in Germany under the Nazis and in Russia under the Communists. I’m a liberal because I believe government must defend of the defenseless. Is there a more defenseless group of human beings than those developing in the womb of their mothers? They have no vote, they have no voice. But they have life. That’s why I’m a liberal who is pro-life. That’s why I’m deeply saddened when clergy and laypeople chose expediency over morality, death over life.

Clergy for Conscience, anyone?

May 12- On Brandeis offering honorary degree to Tony Kushner and hosting a

When, fifty years ago, the institution that has become Roger Williams University decided to break with the YMCA and chart its own independent course, a new name was needed. In a stroke of marketing genius someone suggested “Roger Williams Jr. College.” Brilliant! In a single stroke the fledgling institution acquired an aura of antiquity and and a philosophy to live by. Williams in 1643 obtained a Charter for his colony of “the Providence Plantations in Narragansett Bay” open to all religions and the Indians were to be treated fairly, their lands purchased, not stolen. A better name could not have been appropriated.

Recently, however some students calling themselves the College Republicans began printing a scurrilous broadside they called The Hawk’s Right Eye. It spewed forth attacks on gays, Muslims, and women in what I only hoped was failed sophomoric humor. (Funding for this rag came from outside sources, not University funds.) Then the students went farther. They offered a cash prize to the author of the best essay on the subject “Why I am proud to be white.” (The Republican Party, both nationally and locally had had enough. Each condemned the students and refused to allow them to use the name Republican or any symbols of the Republican Party.)

The University, hearing the rumble of the ground as Roger Williams rolled over in his grave, condemned the contest as an outrage against the principles upon which the university rested. Mass meetings were held where people expressed their views. The president ordered the creation of an on-line journal called “Journal of Civil Discourse” and initiated a distinguished lecturer series with the theme of “reason and respect.” In time the crisis past.

Now it’s Brandeis University’s turn to be placed under the microscope. By 1948 it was already old news that the best American universities had quotas that discriminated against even the best American Jewish students. Just as physicians in the same situation founded their own hospitals, and just as Jews who were excluded from country clubs and hotels created their own, so American Jews created a non-sectarian university where Jewish students could receive an education on a par with the Ivies. What to name this new institution? Well in a stroke of marketing genius it was decided name the school after Louis D. Brandeis who its website describes as: “the distinguished associate justice of the United States Supreme Court [who] reflects the ideals of academic excellence and social justice.” What this too brief biography fails to mention is that justice Brandeis was the president of the Zionist Organization of America. Surely, though, this was one of the important considerations in selecting the name. Just as the name Roger Williams evokes fairness, openness, non-discrimination, evoking Brandeis represents American Jewish ideals including the idea that there should be a Jewish State of Israel supported by American Jewry.

But of late, this ideal has withered. The current president of the university, Jehuda Reinharz has chosen in his inaugural remarks (1995) to define the mission of the university as resting “on four solid pillars: dedication to academic excellence, non-sectarianism, a commitment to social action, and continuous sponsorship the by Jewish community.” What? That’s it? That’s our duty, to fork out dough and shut up? I think not.

Recently Brandeis has done two things that outrage the sentiments of many Jews. This is their right, of course. As an academic institution of the highest caliber it is obligated to present views both popular and fringe. At its upcoming graduation the university will grant an honorary degree to playwright Tony Kushner and its commencement speaker will be His Royal Highness Prince El Hassan bin Talal heir apparent of the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan. That Kushner deserves recognition for his distinguished literary career is beyond question. But the Zionist Organization (justice Brandeis’ old group, you will recall) protests. They quote Kushner as having said that “The biggest supporters of Israel are the most repulsive members of the Jewish community and Israel itself has got this disgraceful record. Israel is a creation of the U.S., bought and paid for.” I will spare you the rest. But note, the sound you hear is of Louis Brandeis rolling over in his grave. President Reinharz comments that Kushner is getting the award for his literary merits, that there is no political test for the honor. What else would you expect him to say?

And then there’s the Palestinian art exhibit on campus. But that’s a story for another time.

That rumble you hear…