Faith, Leadership, and Abortion
Ylisse C. Bess is an interfaith hospital chaplain at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Her ministry is informed by pastoral theology and feminist/womanist theologies. She works at the intersections of faith, culture and healthcare. She holds a bachelor's degree in sociology and religious studies from Gonzaga University; an M.Div. from Boston University School of Theology; and has completed four units of clinical pastoral education at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Learn more here:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ylisse-bess-a9877315/
Show Notes:
0:42 6 week Exhale Virtual Retreat
2:01 Ylisse’s introduction, including her accidental training in abortion volunteer work
4:44 “So people know there is a black woman minister who is supportive of their reproductive needs”
5:14 EMA Fund, Boston Abortion Support Collective
6:00 “I think it is about control, it’s about controlling people’s bodies, people’s money, people’s opinions to center power, and I think that is a part of capitalism and capitalism through patriarchy, and through white supremacy culture, and it lands heavily on fem people and women of color and immigrant women of color”
6:43 “You have more control the more you keep things secret”
7:50 Exploring Shame Through a Lens of Irish Repro History
8:26 “The more I talk about this work, the more people who come forward either needing to get an abortion, or having had an abortion and wishing they had support”
9:11 “I need to be public about my support for abortion. I don’t think it was ever a secret, I just didn’t know that I should be more loud about it, and the benefits of being more up front and loud about that support”
10:29 “As a person of faith, my faith informs me to be a community member to show up for you in your time of need, and to make sure you have what you need, and for me abortion is healthcare, and you need that”
11:12 “I need to make sure that my identity as Christian is tied to my support of abortion, and abortion as healthcare”
12:45 “Whether I know what I’m talking about or not, we’re gonna figure it out together, and I want to be a community member that’s available for exploration”
13:38 “God, where do you expect me to go? What is my role as a person of faith, in policy, in spirituality... how do faith and healthcare come together?”
15:08 “Who does reproductive justice include, and what is it in the first place?”
16:00 “Coming from a Christian tradition people talk about abortion as a sin”
16:30 “How am I gonna articulate what I do believe?”
18:06 Childfree by Choice Episode 81
18:22 The sin of not producing God believing citizens of the world.
21:27 “The control of people’s bodies is about power, using power over people to control them. That’s something that frustrates people, that we are choosing to be liberated.”
24:01 “We (black people) don’t even use the word abortion”
25:30 “Respectability politics”
26:00 “We can talk about or do things that make us less respectable, because that puts us in an even more dangerous position than we already are as black women existing in a white supremeicist society”
26:14 “You can have your abortion but we’re not going to talk about it… to protect ourselves.”
26:36 “An we can’t afford to loose community… for survival”
29:37 Rallying in community secret
30:52 @the_activist_coach
32:41 “We don’t have the power, that social political cultural capital that out white counterparts do have, and that shows up in abortion”
33:09 “It’s messy… make time for the messiness”
36:51 Providing care at every level
38:16 Try without knowing, no need for perfection
39:13 Deconstructing white supremacy and acknowledging the violence that it is
39:42 “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I care enough that I’m willing to mess up, and to mess with people, and be held accountable, and hold others accountable but in love”
42:00 “As you’re following your curiosity, trust yourself.”
