Offices of Black Catholic Ministries, Evangelization team up to present virtual panel Feb. 26 to help address and close minority health care gap

DETROIT — As women desire to take further control of their health and fertility and eliminate the use of hormonal birth control, fertility awareness-based methods of natural family planning (NFP) are becoming more and more mainstream. 

But while NFP has become more common, especially in Catholic circles, communities of color are often left out of the conversation as health care disparities increase. 

To change this, Vickie Figueroa, manager of the Office of Cultural Ministries and coordinator of Black Catholic Ministries with the Archdiocese of Detroit, and Nicole Joyce, the archdiocese’s NFP coordinator, are teaming up to present a fertility awareness and medical advocacy livestream panel discussion geared toward young women of color but open to all. 

“What I’ve found in my research with NFP is that a lot of people in our communities of color –– the Hispanic community, the Black community, even the Asian-American communities –– haven’t had a lot of exposure to the idea of natural family planning or even fertility in general,” Joyce told Detroit Catholic. “In other communities, fertility awareness has really taken off and become really popular even with people who aren’t Catholic because of the benefits: it is not hormonal and you aren’t taking anything synthetic. It’s a lot more natural.”

The virtual panel, which will take place Friday, Feb. 26, from 8-9 p.m., will address the importance of women’s medical advocacy and how learning fertility awareness can help women take an active role in managing their health and wellness. The panel also will include Dr. Lydia Rayes, a Catholic family doctor trained in NaProTECHNOLOGY, a reproductive science designed to identify and treat women’s health concerns without using hormonal contraceptives and with an overall restorative goal. 

Figueroa and Joyce hope to open the floor for questions and discussion. 

A key goal of the webinar will be helping women of color identify early warning signs of conditions like endometriosis and cancer, as well as helping them to understand that symptoms such as heavy bleeding or severe pain during menstruation aren’t necessarily normal and might be indicators of a bigger problem. 

“Those things can all be warning signs of other concerns that can later lead to a doctor trying to perform a hysterectomy before they are ready to have one, or putting them on something like hormonal contraceptives when that is not really what they need,” Joyce said. 

“We now know that hormonal contraceptives come with their own giant list of risk factors,” Joyce added. “So in order to better protect our communities, we need to help women learn and understand those signs so when they go to the doctor they can advocate for themselves and for a more holistic and restorative approach.”

Joyce said even as more women desire to take control of their overall health, this approach is often more accessible to wealthier white communities. 

“A driving factor in how a woman chooses her method of family planning can be, ‘What are the consequences of getting pregnant unexpectedly?’” Joyce said. “NFP is a more privileged practice overall because these are people who have the time and often the money to pursue more information from a theological perspective.”

Figueroa said NFP isn’t widely practiced in the Black community, which she attributes both to the fact that Black women have not been traditionally invited to the conversation as well as a long history of medical distrust stemming from racial coercion and tactics designed to take control over African-American fertility and family size.

Conversations about fertility do take place within the Black community, Figueroa said, but they’ve often not been part of the public discussion. 

“I just want to add the Black perspective to (this discussion),” Figueroa said. “Black people in the Catholic Church are becoming more vocal about having access to all things Catholic, so I am excited that we will be talking about things like (St. John Paul II’s) Theology of the Body, NFP and other pro-life and chastity topics.”

While the webinar will be a great starting point for couples and women, Joyce and Figueroa emphasized there are even more resources available within the archdiocese, and both women are working on ways to introduce more affordable NFP opportunities. 

The archdiocese has a scholarship program that provides grant money to NFP teachers who serve women and couples in financial need, Joyce said, allowing couples to take NFP classes for free. 

“No women will ever be turned away from the Archdiocese of Detroit if they are seeking instruction in NFP, and our teachers are all willing to work with these women in whatever capacity we can, be it online, in person or over the phone. We have built up our ability to serve people,” Joyce said.

Women and couples can find a list of local NFP teachers organized by methods at www.aod.org/nfp. The archdiocese also offers a free NFP course to help women determine which method works best for their bodies and lifestyle at https://www.egwdetroit.org. 

‘Empower. Restore. Inspire.’ webinar

• What: A livestream panel discussion featuring Dr. Lydia Rayes, a local physician, about empowering women to learn more about their own health and wellness, and how this promotes early detection and safe medical treatment for a number of different women’s health issues. Dr. Rayes will be joined by Vickie Figueroa of Black Catholic Ministries, and Nicole Joyce, a FertilityCare Practitioner from the Office of Evangelization.
• When: 8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 26, 2021
• Where: Zoom
• Register: Sign up for the free livestream panel discussion here.