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Vice President Kamala Harris has argued that there is no conflict between religious faith and support for national protections for abortion, as the Supreme Court is poised to issue a major ruling that could curtail abortion rights.
Harris, a practicing Baptist from a multi-faith family background, told reporters on Friday that she had ‘convened faith leaders’ to discuss the abortion issue from a religious perspective.
‘For those of us of faith, I think that we agree, many of us, that there’s nothing about this issue that will require anyone to abandon their faith, or change their faith,’ she said, referring to abortion.
‘It’s simply saying that the government should not have the ability to decide what an individual does with her own body — let her make that decision with her pastor or her rabbi, or whoever she consults,’ added Harris. ‘But it should not be the government making that decision.’
Vice President Kamala Harris argued on Friday that there is no conflict between religious faith and support for national protections for abortion
Harris, whose mother was a Hindu immigrant from India, was raised attending a Baptist church in Oakland, California.
She has said in interviews that she still regularly attends church and professes a Christian faith. Her husband Doug Emhoff is Jewish, making him the first Jewish spouse of a vice president.
Many anti-abortion activists do cite their religious faith in opposing the termination of pregnancies. The Catholic Church, for example, classifies abortion as a grave sin, holding that human life begins at conception and must be respected.
However, many prominent Catholics — notably including President Joe Biden — have spoken in favor of keeping abortion legal nationwide.
On Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat and a practicing Catholic, also addressed the issue of religious faith and abortion after she was banned from taking communion by a bishop in her native San Francisco.
‘Whatever I agree with the pope on is not necessarily what public policy should be in the United States as people make their own judgements, honor their own responsibilities, attend to the needs of their families.’
Harris, who was raised Baptist and still attends church regularly, is seen on a campaign stop at a Michigan church during the 2020 campaign
Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff, who is Jewish, are seen at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh on Friday, paying respects to the victims of a 2018 mass shooting
‘Let me just say this. A woman has a right to choose to live up to her responsibility. It’s up to her, her doctor, her family, her husband, her significant other and her God. This talk of politicizing all of this, I think, is something uniquely American and not right,’ she added.
‘Other countries, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, have had legislative initiatives to expand a woman’s right to choose – very Catholic countries. I’m a very Catholic person, and I believe in every woman’s right to make her own decisions.’
The dioceses of San Francisco; Santa Rosa, California; Tyler, Texas and Arlington, Virginia have all banned Pelosi from receiving Communion.
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, Pelosi’s home district, has been forceful on this issue and wrote Pelosi a letter banning her from the sacrament.
On Sunday Pelosi was spotted at Mass in Washington, D.C. where she did receive Holy Communion.
On Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat and a practicing Catholic, also addressed the issue of religious faith and abortion
A leaked Supreme Court draft opinion indicates that the court could overturn Roe vs. Wade in a ruling that is likely to come by the end of June
The Supreme Court is expected to issue a landmark ruling in the coming weeks that would hand regulation of abortion back over to the respective states, a draft of which was leaked in an unprecedented move last month.
Emotions have run high since the Politico news organization published the draft abortion decision authored by conservative Justice Samuel Alito on May 2.
Since then, protesters have rallied outside the homes of some of the conservative justices.
A California man named Nicholas Roske, carrying a handgun, ammunition, a crow bar and pepper spray, was charged with attempted murder after being arrested on June 8 near Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s Maryland residence.
After the leak, conservative Justice Clarence Thomas, known for his criticism of the Roe ruling, said on May 6 at a legal conference in Atlanta that the court should not be ‘bullied into giving you just the outcomes you want.’
The abortion ruling will come in a case involving a Republican-backed Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy that was struck down by lower courts as a violation of the Roe precedent.
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