Showing Our Struggles as Catholics, and the Power of Listening
I recently participated in an online RC gathering on Catholics and the U.S. election. It was led by Joanne Bray, International Liberation Reference Person for Catholics. My highlight was that we showed our struggles as Catholics to a group that was listening as Catholics. It was safe, healing, and powerful for me.
I am a white U.S. raised-middle-class woman, widowed, who has had an abortion. I am writing this anonymously because it still does not feel safe to admit to having had an abortion.
In the group I told the story of my abortion and the healing work I had done on it. It felt different to tell the story to a large group of Catholics and to have Joanne reminding me that I’d been a young Catholic female when I’d done something “stupid” that had resulted in pregnancy. After I told the story, I was able to take in the power of the Catholic group attention and review in my mind many other “stupid” things I had done. They are things I have felt isolated with, even in the RC Community. They are things that are humiliating, things that an experienced RCer and women’s liberation leader would “never” have done.
I knew that working in this way created the space for everyone to client more openly.
I could see in the group that the irrational things we had done that had led to pregnancy had been the result of sexism. And usually we had done the things quite a few times, not just once, and each time could have resulted in pregnancy. (Men also need to work on having had unprotected sex.)
Someone shared an article that showed the power of good listening in changing the mind of a voter. I realized that I could be on a phone bank and authentically listen, without arguing or trying to convert the person I was listening to. Working on abortion, as Catholics, had shown me the power of listening, our RC “one-point program”—listening with the goal of helping someone regain their full intelligence.
USA
(Present Time 202, January 2021)