Spirit of Love and Power, we are gathered today in beloved community that we might manifest in our lives the values and truths that we hold dear. Let us rejoice that we are together for this time is holy time, the transformation we seek is holy work, and the bonds that hold us together are sacred.
On this day [January 22], as we celebrate the landmark 1973 Roe V. Wade supreme court decision that gave women the right to make important decisions about their bodies, we would join in gratitude for all those who made this possible and continue to make this possible - the activists, the lawyers, the religious leaders, our elected leaders, and especially the health care professionals who risk their lives and live with increasing levels of intimidation and harassment because of their commitment to provide women the means to make the important choices for themselves and their families. We are grateful as well for all those ordinary men and women who sign petitions, who write our legislators and speak to our daughters and sons about what it means to be responsible and mature and to respect their own bodies and the bodies of others.
We of the free church tradition, know that choice is at the heart of our faith, that freedom of conscience is one of our cornerstones, and that we have been entrusted with the means and the faculties to make wise and loving and sometimes difficult decisions about the most important matters of life. We know that when we listen to the still small voice within that we have met the sacred, and we know and trust that when women listen deeply to that still small voice they are moral agents, and that every choice is a blessed choice, a manifestation of the sacred power of life that we are entrusted with. We would pray, then, not only for the continued freedom to do so, but that we might stand in reverence before the trust and responsibility that has been given to each of us. Let us teach each other and our children how to use well these sacred gifts that we may transform ourselves, our community, and our world.
In the spirit of truth, compassion and wholeness, this we pray.