The Common Ground Network for Life and Choice Manual

etween people related to one another by shared community, faith, citizenship, and concern. It
recognizes that we are all affected by tears in the larger social fabric. It asks participants to
relate to one another as "all of us against the problems we face" rather than "part of us against
the rest of us."
Why Search for Common Ground?
Not everyone is able or willing to join in the search for common ground at the moment
they are invited to do so. Participants need a genuine desire to be heard and to listen to others.
The ability to listen includes not feeling compromised by hearing statements and views with
which you strongly disagree without having to rebut them or convert others to your way of
thinking.
Searching for common ground happens through an openness to exploring areas of
common concern as well as difference, sharing personal experiences and beliefs about an issue,
setting aside generalities and rhetoric, and speaking as individuals, not as representatives of
organizations and institutions.
The motives people give for entering into a search for common ground on abortion
frequently include:
• A belief that the level of confrontation over abortion is "out of hand" and
destructive.
• A perception that the level of conflict is not furthering needed social change or
helping the powerless and disadvantaged.
• The sense that the tone of the conflict is uncomfortably "out of sync" with a
personal system of beliefs about how people should treat one another.
• A painful experience of division -- division between people of faith, between
women, between family members, between community members -- and a belief
in reconciliation, reconnection, and the need for people to learn to live in
community despite serious differences.