Who are the Christian feminists who launched a letter in defense of abortion

The Evangelical Women for Gender Equality (EIG) movement and the Catholic NGO for the Right to Decide last month launched a public letter in defense of the legalization of abortion. At the demonstration, the groups claim that they will continue to denounce “religious fundamentalisms” and that the decision to have an abortion should not be the subject of “religious arbitration”.

The text was the target of several criticisms inside and outside the churches, mainly for two reasons. First, contrary to what feminists say, the condemnation of the practice of abortion, the murder of a human being in the mother’s womb, is not a religious issue, but one of fundamental human rights (in this case, the right to life). , regardless of whether a person believes in God or not. Then, attention is drawn to the fact that the signatories consider themselves “Christians”, despite Christianity’s age-old condemnation of any violence against the unborn.

Other inaccuracies in the text were raised, such as the statement that a “woman would die every two days victim of unsafe abortion in Brazil”, which is not true, not even counting data prior to 2017, or that there would be women arrested for having an abortion in Brazil. country, which is also questionable, according to data from the Ministry of Justice.

The guidelines of these feminists

The Evangelicals for Gender Equality call themselves “Christian” women who “fight for gender equality, social justice and who act to change the situation of Evangelicals in their churches and society”. The group uses the problem of violence against women in society to defend agendas such as abortion (as a solution to attacks against women) and others from left-wing militancy.

The most recent publication on its website is a public note against the Statute of the Unborn Child, proposed in Congress that intends to guarantee the protection of human life from conception. For them, the Statute would be “a violence without size”, for supposedly infringing women’s reproductive rights.

“Progressive” agendas are defended with biblical phrases or themes and neutral language. “And we evangelical women suffer in the body along with all and all other women, the pain, the fear of being a woman in Brazil”, they write.

“Not unlike biblical women, we are still being silenced, made invisible, disrespected, persecuted, raped and killed for being women. That’s why we EIG Women choose, recognize and name the Spirit of God by the female name RUAH, as it appears in the Hebrew originals of the Old Testament, to keep away from us the patriarchy that wants to dominate our bodies and spirituality. Ruah, for us is the feminine dimension of God”.

The NGO Catholics for the Right to Decide also uses religion to promote the legalization of abortion and gender issues. Despite adopting the term “Catholic”, the association goes against Catholicism. The Catholic Church defends life from conception and affirms that the practice of abortion is a serious offense against God.

The “Catholics” in the group say that their organization “relies on feminist practice and theory to promote changes in our society, especially in cultural and religious patterns”. The organization also employs biblical verses and religious discourse to promote other leftist agendas.

The name of the organization has already been involved in a lawsuit in court, when the Dom Bosco Association, made up of Catholics, requested that the organization no longer use the name “Católicas”. In 2020, the 2nd Chamber of Private Law of the Court of Justice of São Paulo decided that the movement could no longer use the name, since, according to the rapporteur, Judge José Carlos Ferreira Alves, it is not “minimally rational and logical, in addition , the use of the expression ‘católicas’ by an entity that fights Catholicism concretely with ideas and agendas that are clearly antagonistic to it”.

But, in September 2022, the Superior Court of Justice (STJ), analyzing a special appeal filed by the feminist association, declared that the Dom Bosco Center (CDB) had no legitimacy to apply on behalf of the Church. As a result, the NGO continues to use the name “Católicas”.

Some activists and “feminist theologians” are at the forefront of these movements and contribute to the intensification of these groups, which differ from the traditional teachings of Christian churches.