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ABSTRACT
African American women are facing a tripartite pandemic. COVID-19 continues to relentlessly sweep through our families and communities. White supremacy infects our justice system as we await – impatiently – for the justice of Breonna Taylor and other women like her. And, there remains an ever-present and expanding pandemic of mistreatment in black maternal healthcare that has impacted the lives of countless women since our arrival to this land. This essay explores the pandemic of mistreatment in black maternal healthcare in light of the pandemic and through a womanist clinical pastoral theology articulates a response to interrupt it. This essay explores the birth story of Opal, who tells her story while living with COVID-19. Psychoanalytic frameworks are interwoven throughout Opal’s living human narrative to birth a womanist clinical pastoral response advocating for black birthwork as spiritual care.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Hamel et al., “Race, Health, and COVID-19,” 22–24.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid., 26–27.
4 The term ‘birthing person/people’ is used in some research as a shift away from the term ‘mother,’ recognizing that not all people who give birth identify as a woman, as a mother, or intend to parent the child they birth.
5 Niles et al., “Reflecting on Equity in Perinatal Care During a Pandemic,” 330.
6 Dayna Bowen Matthew, Just Medicine, Kindle location 73.
7 Niles et al., “Reflecting on Equity,” 330.
8 Ibid.
9 Ibid., 331.
10 Ibid.
11 Boisen, “The Living Human Document,” 29.
12 Jackson and Mazzei, “Plugging One Text Into Another,” 264.
13 Foster Boyd, “WomanistCare,” 4674.
14 Montagno, “Midwives and Holy Subversives,” 6.
15 Miller-McLemore, “Introduction: The Contributions of Practical Theology,” 14.
16 Claremont School of Theology Institutional Review Board Study Number: 2019-1101.
17 The name “Opal” is a pseudonym with no identifying markers to protect the participant and her family’s confidentiality.
18 Jackson and Mazzei, Thinking with Theory in Qualitative Research, Kindle Location 97.
19 Comas-Díaz, “Mujerista Psychospirituality”.
I borrow the term psychospirituality from mujerista psychology. Comas-Díaz notes the interdisciplinary aspect of mujerista psychology that engages with a mujerista theology rooted in liberation and feminist theologies. Comas-Díaz acknowledges this interconnection of psychology and contextual theologies as embodied in the critical role of the metaphysical in the inner-world of Latinas/os. She describes mujerista psychospirituality as mujerista’s resistance, wisdom, and agency. I borrow Comas-Díaz’s concept rooted in mujerismo and re-appropriate the concept for womanism.
20 Jackson and Mazzei, Thinking with Theory, 5.
21 Oparah et al., Battling Over Birth, 121.
22 Ibid., 112.
23 Ibid.,113.
24 Ibid., 114.
25 Ibid.
26 Matthew, Just Medicine, Kindle location 1026.
27 See more on the U.S. Public Health Service Syphilis Study at Tuskegee and its legacy: Scharff et al., “More than Tuskegee”.
28 Washington, Medical Apartheid, 9.
29 Cooper-White, Shared Wisdom, Kindle Location 844.
30 Collins, Black Feminist Thought, 79.
31 Bryant-Davis and Comas-Díaz, “Introduction: Womanist and Mujerista Psychologies,” 3.
32 Neville and Pieterse, “Racism, White Supremacy, and Resistance,” 167.
33 Myers, “Theoretical and Conceptual Approaches to African and African American Psychology,” 35.
34 Neville and Pieterse, “Racism, White Supremacy, and Resistance,” 168.
35 Shorter-Gooden, “Multiple Resistance Strategies”.
36 Bryant-Davis and Comas-Díaz, “Introduction: Womanist and Mujerista Psychologies,” 12.
37 Ibid., 13.
38 Banks and Lee, “Womanism and Spirituality/Theology,” 125.
39 Ibid., 127.
40 Ibid., 128
41 Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness, 20.
42 Ibid., 21.
43 Ibid., 15.
44 Ibid.,108.
45 Foster Boyd, “WomanistCare,” Kindle Location 4737. An “empowered cojourner” describes an empathic presence providing contextual spiritual care in the African American women’s context. This image juxtaposes other pastoral theological images such as the “Wounded Healer” and in turn embodies empowerment, collectivity, and wholeness.
46 Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness, 119.
47 Ibid.,109.
48 Oparah et al., Battling Over Birth, 136.
49 Ibid., 137.
50 Ibid., 46.
51 Ibid.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Jessica Chapman Lape
Jessica Chapman Lape is a womanist pastoral theologian, educator, clinical chaplain, and community-trained doula. Chapman Lape received her B.S. in Health Education from Johnson C. Smith University, her Master of Divinity from Wake Forest University School of Divinity with an emphasis in Faith and Health of the Public, and receives her Ph.D. in Practical Theology from Claremont School of Theology in May 2021. Chapman Lape writes, speaks, and researches at the intersections of pastoral care, African American women’s lived experience, and U.S. healthcare.