To Offer Compassion

A History of the Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion

By: Doris Andrea Dirks

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Hardcover | 16 May 2017

At a Glance

Hardcover
240 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
22.86 x 15.24 x 1.42

Hardcover

$53.90

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In 1967, when abortion was either illegal or highly restricted in every U.S. state, a group of ministers and rabbis formed to counsel women with unwanted pregnancies-including referral to licensed physicians willing to perform the procedure. By 1973, when the Roe v. Wade court decision made abortion legal nationwide, the Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion (CCS) had spread from coast to coast, referred hundreds of thousands of women for safe abortions without a single fatality, become a medical consumer advocacy group, and opened its own clinic in New York City.

As religious leaders spoke out on issues of civil rights, peace, or poverty, CCS members were also called to action by the suffering of women who had approached them for help. Overwhelmingly male, white, affluent, and middle-aged, these mainline Protestant and Jewish clergy were nonetheless outspoken advocates for the rights of women, particularly poor women. To Offer Compassion is a detailed history of this unique and largely forgotten movement, drawing on extensive interviews with original participants and on primary documents from the CCS's operations.

Industry Reviews

This compelling history explores one of the twentieth century's most unusual religious endeavors-the collective defiance of American clergy who were willing to help direct women to illegal but safe abortions. No previous account of the Clergy Consultation Service has told their whole story so thoroughly and vividly."" -Cynthia Gorney,author of Articles of Faith: A Frontline History of the Abortion Wars

"Provides a compelling account of the important, but nearly forgotten development in the abortion debate: the advent in 1967 of the first organized religious support for abortion rights." - The Times Literary Supplement

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