On a scorching afternoon in mid-July, clergy members gathered outside a small unmarked building tucked away in a business complex in North Austin. They filed inside, up the stairs, and into the waiting room of the Whole Woman’s Health abortion clinic. There, Christian and Jewish leaders stood in a circle and sang phrases in chorus: Hallelujah. Do not fear. You are loved. Bless this room. Bless this womb.
The 20 or so people had assembled not to protest, but to bless the clinic, burning sage in the exam rooms and reading patient and staff testimonials. “We’re gathered together today to affirm this as a sacred space,” said Reverend Cari Jackson, with the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice. “To affirm this as a space in which people meet God, in ways that some might not understand. … In the cacophony of noise today, it is important that we gather in spaces and affirm the blessing, lest we begin believing the noise.”
