Never before in our U.S. history has the Federal Government forced citizens to directly purchase what violates our religious beliefs. The issue here . . . is the survival of a cornerstone constitutionally protected freedom that ensures respect for conscience and religious liberty. -Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston Read more…
by Jim Hoft
Last week Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan lashed out at the Obama Administration for forcing religious organizations to go out into the marketplace and buy a product that violates their conscience. The rule would force Christian organizations to provide free contraceptives, sterilizations and abortion drugs to workers even though this violates Catholic Church teaching. The new rules are so strict that most Catholic institutions will not qualify for an exemption. Read more…
By Michelle Bauman
A letter from 154 bipartisan members of Congress is urging the Obama administration to reverse a contraception mandate that religious employers say would require them to violate their consciences. Read more…
WASHINGTON— The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops offers the following clarifications regarding the Health and Human Services regulations on mandatory coverage of contraceptives, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs. Read more…
The Obama Adminstration is attacking religious rights by mandating that all health-care plans, even church-run one, must provide cover for abortion and contraception.
On January 11, the United States Supreme Court reproved the Obama Administration by issuing a 9-0 decision against the Government in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC (CaseNo. 10-553). It unanimously rejected the Administration’s cramped view of the religious rights of church congregations in regard to whom they employ as their ministers. An explanation of the case has appeared in MercatorNet. Read more…
Co-laborers,
We must all act together NOW. What is going on today is the greatest test of religious liberty we will have faced in our life time.
If the administration does not back down, religious liberty—as clearly articulated in the Constitution and in court cases—will be gravely impaired. And your organization, like mine, will face the question of civil disobedience. Read more…
by Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse
No, I’m not exaggerating. The American Experiment in religious liberty is officially over. The First Amendment provided institutional structures that allow different religions to peacefully coexist. All groups agree to NOT try to capture governmental structures for the benefit of their own particular denomination. Read more…
WASHINGTON—The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has issued the following response to the February 2 post on the White House blog.
The Obama administration, to justify its widely criticized mandate for contraception and sterilization coverage in private health plans, has posted a set of false and misleading claims on the White House blog (“Health Reform, Preventive Services, and Religious Institutions,” February 1). In what follows, each White House claim is quoted with a response.
Claim: “Churches are exempt from the new rules: Churches and other houses of worship will be exempt from the requirement to offer insurance that covers contraception.” Read more…
By Kevin J. Jones
Washington D.C., Jan 25, 2012 / 05:52 pm (CNA).- A Democratic-leaning Catholic group’s favorable reaction to the Obama administration’s new contraception mandate is being criticized for neglecting the threat to religious freedom and wrongly claiming that contraception lowers the abortion rate.
“This is a real attack on the religious freedom of millions of Americans. People who care about the future of our country should not stand idly by,” said Eric Rassbach, national litigation director of the D.C.-based Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. Read more…
“The Catholic Church defends religious liberty, including freedom of conscience, for everyone. The Amish do not carry health insurance. The government respects their principles. Christian Scientists want to heal by prayer alone, and the new health-care reform law respects that. Quakers and others object to killing even in wartime, and the government respects that principle for conscientious objectors. By its decision, the Obama administration has failed to show the same respect for the consciences of Catholics and others who object to treating pregnancy as a disease.”
Way to put it into perspective. Clearly a double standard and discrimination against Catholics.
The Catholic Bishops of Maryland have issued a statement, “The Most Sacred of All Property: Religious Freedom and the People of Maryland.”
Despite its title, the principles it lays out and the examples it uses are applicable to the entire United States. People of all faiths, not just Catholics, will find it a helpful defense when faced with marriage and family issues.
Read it here.
If there is one thing that disaffection with “Wall Street” has achieved it is the ramping up of moral discourse. Not since the Great Depression, probably, have we heard so much about greed, corruption and injustice. But if you want people to be temperate, honest and just, they have to have two things: firm principles and a functioning conscience. How surprising, then, that the New York Times thinks we need neither. Read more…
From the National Center for Policy Analysis:
Though the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) is most often discussed in terms of its effects on health insurance and medical care costs, the ACA will have numerous effects in various facets of American society. Specifically, its financial and taxing system will create incentives that perhaps the authors of the bill did not foresee, including that the average American worker will be discouraged from marrying and working in a wide range of circumstances, says Diana Furchtgott-Roth, a senior fellow with the Manhattan Institute. [emphasis added] Read more…
Early last month, President Obama bragged to a St. Louis crowd about the recent Health and Human Services’ regulations that will require thousands of religious employers to pay for contraception, sterilization and drugs that probably cause abortions. The crowd cheered the president’s contraceptive mandate. He joined their revelry, shouting, “Darn Tootin’!” to the crowd’s delight. Read more…
by Helen Alvaré
October 19, 2011 http://www.thepublicdiscourse.
New York Times reporter Linda Greenhouse refuses to see the truth about contraception, conscience, and religious liberty.
I wouldn’t be the first to question the judgment of New York Times‘ former Supreme Court reporter, Linda Greenhouse. That’s already been done by National Public Radio, the New York Times‘ public editor Byron Calame, and a member of the executive committee of the Pulitzer Prize Board, on account of Ms. Greenhouse’s penchant for bouts of very public, very raw, and quite emotional political partisanship, even while she was a “hard news” reporter for the Times. Now, as an “opinionator,” she’s grown worse. Read more…
Given the expressed intent of the Founding Fathers in establishing a free, just and virtuous society, the importance of morality as its foundation, and their recourse to God from the beginning through recent history…it’s remarkable that we are in this battle now. Read more…
by Becky Yeh
A pro-family leader is calling on California’s governor to veto a dangerous bill that he and other family advocates believe undermines parental authority and the safety of children.
Governor Jerry Brown has several days to decide on the fate of AB 499, a bill that would allow minors as young as 12 years of age to consent to “medical care related to the prevention of a sexually transmitted disease.” The bill, introduced by Assemblywoman Toni Atkins (D), would allow children to agree to vaccines and treatments without the consent of parents, including the vaccine Gardasil. Read more…
You are wielding unchecked power, and you are out of control. Please pay heed.
A couple of months ago, HHS announced a new “preventive care” package of services for women to be included in insurance coverage that defied reason and morals. It drew plenty of outcries for review and oversight. HHS left open a window of time for “public comment” that closed at midnight September 30th. Read more…
September 28, 2011 http://www.thepublicdiscourse.
The HHS mandate on contraception is based on insufficient research and betrays the committee’s deep pro-contraceptive bias. Read more…
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