As part of Plan A, its nationwide campaign to foster access to safe and affordable contraception, the National Council of Jewish Women has been encouraging local communities to tackle the topics that stir controversy — like religion, emergency contraception, and insurance coverage.

Those will all be up for discussion on Wednesday evening, Oct. 10, at a forum sponsored by NCJW's Union County Section, and hosted by Congregation Beth Israel in Scotch Plains. The program is open to the community.

The speakers will include two religious leaders known for their willingness to engage in open debate: Beth Israel's Rabbi George Nudell, who will discuss Jewish perspectives on birth control, and Rev. Geoffrey B. Curtiss of All Saints Episcopal Parish in Hoboken, who will offer a liberal Christian perspective.

Gloria Brown, advocacy chair for the Union County Section and a nurse with Jewish Family Service of Central New Jersey, will introduce the panel.

"This is a program to help you learn about this issue and decide what your personal response should be in the context of your personal and religious beliefs," she said.

NCJW's Plan A, launched in June, promotes universal access to contraceptive information and healthcare services, including abortion.

The organization's leaders say that while there is overwhelming public support in the United States for sex education and widespread use of contraceptives, "an extreme religious minority is increasingly influencing policy and practices — spreading misinformation, blocking women's access, and signaling that access to complete and accurate information and to safe and effective contraceptive options can no longer be taken for granted."

Nudell said that Jewish tradition clearly has a different perspective on women's reproductive choice than the liberal positions taken by NCJW and other women's advocacy groups.

"That being said, Judaism began discussing these issues over 2,000 years ago in the Talmud, and the Jewish tradition has much insight to offer as we engage in today's debates and healthcare policy decisions," he said.

Curtiss will represent the New Jersey Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, the state branch of a national interfaith clergy association founded to defend the constitutional right to abortion.

Earlier this year, Curtiss was one of the RCRC experts who developed "In Good Conscience: Guidelines for the Ethical Provision of Health Care in a Pluralistic Society." The guidelines were in part a rebuttal to what it called "sectarian restrictions imposed on health care," including the Catholic Church's directives banning abortion services at Catholic healthcare institutions.

"The Church for too long has been dominated by a patriarchal understanding of God and the creation in which we live, move, and have our being; this understanding diminishes the role of women and treats women and their issues with a subservient perspective," said Curtiss in a written statement addressing his participation on the panel. "This world view is changing and we are discovering one that honors women, their bodies, and their selves."

While NJ law prohibits pharmacists from blocking women's access to contraceptive products, the panelists will discuss ways in which filling prescriptions or buying over-the-counter products is made difficult in other parts of the country. According to the NCJW, reports about such obstruction have come in from 19 states.

One of the most controversial issues tackled by the organization's Plan A campaign is the product known as Plan B, the so-called "morning-after pill" designed to be taken after unprotected sex or when the intended contraceptive method has failed. NCJW activists say that although it has been shown to be safe and effective, in many hospital emergency rooms victims of sexual assault aren't offered Plan B or told how it works.

The cost of contraception will also be discussed. Brown pointed out that while Medicaid programs are required to cover pregnancy-related care for low-income women living at or below 133 percent of the federal poverty line, they are not required to cover family planning services for those same women.

NCJW's literature says the teen pregnancy rate in the United States is significantly higher than in many other developed countries because of less contraceptive use by sexually active teenagers. Young women, said Brown, face a "lack of accurate information, financial limitations, unreasonable age restrictions, and parental notification and/or consent laws."

The panel discussion is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m. and will be followed by a question-and-answer period. For more information, call Beth Israel at 908-889-1830.