Jennifer Dalven is director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project, which has been involved in the debate over health care workers refusing to provide services to women. Contact her through the media line.   

Gretchen Borchelt is senior counsel at the National Women’s Law Center in Washington, D.C. The center fights against pharmacy refusals and state bans on insurance coverage of abortion. Contact  Maria Patrick.

The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice in Washington, D.C., pushes for more health care options for women, not fewer. It sponsors a National Black Religious Summit on Sexuality each year. Michael Mitchell is director of communications.

Ilyse Hogue is president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. The nonprofit advocacy group supports “near-universal contraception coverage.” The website lists affiliates around the country.

Rebecca Wind is press contact for the Alan Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit organization in New York and Washington, D.C., focused on sexual and reproductive health research and policy analysis.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has raised concerns about a range of freedom of conscience questions related to protection of life issues and supports including conscience provisions in proposed funding bills.

This April 2004 Pew Internet & American Life survey found that 64 percent of wired Americans have used the Internet for spiritual purposes.

This March 31, 2006, article in The New York Times cites a long-awaited study that showed prayer offered by strangers had no effect on the recovery of people who were undergoing heart surgery, and patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of post-operative complications.

Patrick McCormick is a professor of religious studies at Gonzaga University, in Spokane, Wash., where he teaches about Christian ethics, medical ethics and Catholic social teachings. He is author of Sin as Addiction (Paulist Press, 1989) and Character, Choices & Community: The Three Faces of Christian Ethics (Paulist Press, 1998). He has served as a consultant on various hospital […]