Pres. Obama’s attempts to fool people into thinking that he respects our religious freedom

From CNA:

HHS revises mandate third time; foes say it misses the point

Washington D.C., Aug 28, 2012 / 03:58 am (CNA/EWTN News).- A slight revision of the federal contraception mandate offers some additional protection for certain religious employers but is not sufficient to ease religious freedom concerns, said a lawyer who is working to challenge the mandate in court.

Hannah Smith, senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, told CNA on Aug. 27 that the Obama administration is governing by “sloppy executive fiat” and is failing to address the underlying problem with the controversial mandate.

She explained that for the third time in seven months, the federal government has rewritten the guidelines for the “safe harbor” that offers a one-year reprieve from the mandate to some non-profit religious organizations that object to its demands.

They’re making it up as they go along,” she said. “They haven’t really thought through these issues carefully.” [Or they are stalling. Cunctando regitur mundus. In the meantime, the White House of the First Gay President can shrug and say “Hey! WE are trying but THEY are not working with us!]

The Becket Fund is representing Wheaton College, a Christian liberal arts college in Illinois, in a lawsuit challenging the mandate. The controversial rule requires employers to offer health insurance that covers contraception, sterilization and early abortion drugs, even if doing so violates their consciences.

[…]

November 2012!

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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11 Comments

  1. RichR says:

    I had to have the talk with my employees today about our group insurance. I read the guidelines posted by the National Catholic Bioethics Center and decided how I was going to proceed. It is a horrible position for a conscientious employer to be in – choosing between his conscience and putting his employees at serious financial risk should they get sick or have an accident.

    My employees know full well who is to blame for this…..and they are not happy with BHO at all. The wonderful thing is, they totally understand my position and support me. They’re the greatest.

  2. Dave N. says:

    I’m wondering how Hannah Smith can complain about the constantly-being-rewritten guidelines for the safe harbor and then later the same day claim “partial victory” for having forced the government to re-write the guidelines. This doesn’t quite make sense to me.

    http://www.christianpost.com/news/wheaton-college-lawsuit-dismissed-given-one-year-to-comply-with-contraception-mandate-80737/

    Also, the CNA article should have mentioned that Wheaton’s case was dismissed last Friday, an important point–although I’m sure they will find ways to challenge the mandate in the future.

  3. jhayes says:

    Wheaton does not oppose all means of contraception. – only some. They pointed out that this made them ineligible for the one-year safe harbor available to institutions that havn’t covered any contraceptive services since February of this year – because Wheaton does cover some kinds and will continue to do so.

    HHS revised the safe harbor language so Wheaton would qualify for it. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

  4. jhayes says:

    I read the guidelines posted by the National Catholic Bioethics Center and decided how I was going to proceed.

    I went to their webpage at http://www.ncbcenter.org/ but couldn’t find any recommendations for employers.

    Could you give a link?

  5. wmeyer says:

    RichR: I can’t recall now the name, but I do remember you were exploring a new carrier whose product wold be compatible with Church teaching. Did that not work out, or is it not yet available, or what?

  6. jhayes says:

    Found it: http://www.ncbcenter.org/page.aspx?pid=1166

    Why did you decide against following their last scenario: provide the contraceptive coverage but only until state insurance exchanges open in 2014?

  7. HeatherPA says:

    “The Amateur” by Edward Klein is a must read for all people disgusted with Obama- actually all citizens period. While some of the things he states aren’t fully researched (he does talk about Obama’s support for the killing of infants who are born alive during abortion, but misses the mark), the book is enlightening. And he discusses the mandate pretty well.

  8. St. Epaphras says:

    wmeyer, (Yes, I know I am not RichR)…however, the Catholic health share program is called Solidarity Health Share and is not yet available. I think January?? You can sign up for information from them, though. I looked at 2 protestant ones but had an “issue” with part of their statements of faith. Sounded like sola fide to me. This one seemed very promising; hope it is accepted as an alternative like the protestant health share programs already are.

  9. jhayes says:

    I looked at some of the Protestant ones. One problem was that they required you to have a pastor who was willing to take the time to check your medical bills and certify that they were necessary.

    Another issue was whether there were enough people in the group to share the risk. If you needed a million dollars worth of cancer care, would the group members be able to come up with that amount of money? And if they could do it for one person whould they be able to do it for several more?

  10. Therese says:

    Perhaps he’s hoping another uproar over the mandate will score his campaign more points in the media and some much-needed momentum from Catholic bashers.

    HHS is indeed stalling. Claims of forthcoming “accommodations” are still spouting from this government agency, causing expensive lawsuits to be dropped on account of prematurity. What a disgusting tactic.

  11. AnnAsher says:

    Obama and the HHS mandate are starkly resembling the story line in Eclipse of the Sun -Michael O’Brien. It’s kinda freakin me out!

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