"Guts full of anger and compassion"

And other links for your Sunday

This Friday, I helped to bring historical documents from Iowa Abortion Access Fund to the Iowa Women’s Archive.

Going through the old newsletters and meeting notes was fascinating. The fund has grown significantly in the past 10 years due to the rising need, the attacks on reproductive rights, and the slow erosion of access over the years.

The Iowa Abortion Access Fund is one of the oldest funds in the nation. Formed in Cedar Rapids in 1969, four years before the Roe decision, the fund was created by a radical group of clergy, who saw the need for abortion in their congregations and community. The fund has always been dedicated to helping people access abortion care.

I am so proud to be part of this group. Part of a radical tradition of community and care founded in my own town. Going through the documents I noticed names of friends and neighbors who have supported the fund for decades and are still here, still doing the work, no matter who is in power.

Among the fund’s archive of newsletters, budgets, meeting minutes, and flyers was a letter from one of the founders. Written about 10 years after the fund was founded, the letter feels like it could have been written today. It’s a powerful statement about the need for abortion and the cowardice and nastiness of the anti-choice movement (as he calls it). I don’t have permission to share his name at this moment. But I wanted to share the letter with you.

It’s beautiful, it’s funny, and it’s depressing how relevant it is, nearly 60 years later.

I’m also including a picture of an anti-choice mailer that included the most god-awful piece of poetry that I’ve ever read. (Spoiler: It rhymes “abort” with “court.”) According to my friend’s daughter, “That poem is what should be aborted.”