Tide of public opinion will swing against Obamacare…. er um… the so-called, misnamed, AFFORDABLE Care Act.
Has your insurance been cancelled yet?
First, people will see that it’s a bad idea which will cost far too much for far too many. Second, they will see it as overreach by the ever-more-invasive State.
The Chicago Tribune published an editorial today against the President’s attack on the Little Sisters of the Poor. The opinion piece still gets it wrong, but it it gets one piece right:
We’re not arguing against insurance coverage of contraceptives. But a government mandate that religious organizations violate the tenets of their faith is an unconstitutional reach.
The administration should provide a much broader conscience exemption for the insurance mandate. Exempt from these rules is any entity that would be forced to contravene its religious teachings and beliefs. Abide by the constitutional principle: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof … [I think the President would overturn the 1st Amendment, if he could. And the second… and the third… and the fourth…]
Obamacare is the law of the land. But the constitutional protection of religious freedom shouldn’t be parsed or shaded by the law.
USAToday also has an opinion piece about the attack on the Little Sisters of the Poor.
Wisely, churches and other houses of worship are exempt from the requirement, but the administration wrote rules so narrowly that they failed to exempt Catholic and other religiously affiliated hospitals, colleges and charities. Its position was constitutionally suspect, politically foolish and ultimately unproductive. The number of women affected is likely so small that the administration could find some less divisive way to provide the coverage.
[…]
If the president offered a more meaningful compromise, other religious leaders would have a hard time saying no. The public health impact would be minimal. And religious freedom would be granted the wide berth it deserves.
Again, they are for the stupid law, but they are at least not with the administration in the undermining of our religious freedom.
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Until all people of faith who may own a ‘secular’ business are exempt, any support for this monstrosity is not respecting the first amendment rights of the American people. They shouldn’t support the law that forces the devout Catholic owner of a furniture manufacturing business any more than they should a group of religious sisters. He should have rights defended too.
I wish I could be as optimistic as you. Regardless of whether public opinion sways against ObamaCare or not, I think we are stuck with it. It seems that the vast population isn’t paying attention to the issues. At election time, they vote for the candidate who will give them “free stuff.” If they receive a cancellation notice or an outrageous premium increase, they will blame it on the cruel, cold-hearted Republicans who don’t want them to have insurance. The religious liberty argument is not understood by those who are not paying attention — they think Catholics are trying to impose their religious practices on everyone by fighting the contraceptives mandate. Sorry to be such a pessimist, but after what happened in 2012, I can’t help it.
O God, please clean up the mess.
pannw,
The key problem is that the population at large have bought into the modernist/liberal christian idea that religion is just a lifestyle choice and that religion is just what you hang on to to feel better. With “church hopping” extremely popular in the U.S ( http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/07/ecclesial-consumerism/ ) with people changing churches or even denominations dozens of times in their lives, people accept that their religious beliefs will change throughout their lives. If there’s so much fluidity on morality and the nature of salvation and the other issues such as relativism and “lifestyle religions” are taken into account, religious freedom simply doesn’t make sense.
Catholicism stands in stark contrast to this since it has unchangeable doctrines that may never be violated, but unfortunately that’s seeped into the Church since Vatican II with people picking the parish that best suits their tastes, styles, and provides the best amenities and social groups rather than go to the local parish, the same as everyone else in your neighbourhood. And widespread Cafeteria Catholicism doesn’t help.
So religious freedom is a hard sell (even among Catholics), that’s getting hard to sell as society declines into atheistic secularism.
The need to force these nuns is related to a much more sinister program against religion. You know those movie melodramas where the big earthmovers are about to flatten the little guys?
I doubt the Obama regime ever really cared what the American people think. Now they have just dropped all pretense of caring.
The whole reason the regime is attacking the Church over contraceptives is precisely because so many Catholics have caved on contraceptives. This is why, when the bishops try to rally the troops, there are none to be found. Now that so many Catholics have repudiated the Church’s teaching on contraceptives, our enemies feel perfectly entitled to call us on our hypocrisy when we object to being attacked on that point.
The tide may turn as it gets more expensive, but the only thing that will happen is what Obama has been planning all along – the government will swoop in with the “rescue:” the single-payer system. Obama doesn’t care how bad it is just now. He doesn’t want the system Obamacare is meant to usher in. He wants 100% government-run, government-control health care.
Ms Moore, OP said: “This is why, when the bishops try to rally the troops, there are none to be found.”
True enough. The troops who the bishops, if they had been MEN instead of the jelly-backboned accommodation specialists with nuanced pronouncements, could have been called upon were contracepted or murdered by _c_atholics in about the same relative numbers as the rest of society since the 60s.
We (collectively) brought this on ourselves. Let the be no doubt. We are reaping what we (collectively) sowed.
panw,
Yes, exactly – and further, “Until all people whatever who conscientiously need exemption and who may own a ‘secular’ business are in fact exempt,…”
anilwang,
How to unpick the idea that uncritical monolithic suppression of conscientious freedom somehow make sense?
Sorry: “makes”
” people picking the parish that best suits their tastes, styles, and provides the best amenities and social groups rather than go to the local parish”
Teach at one attend the same one I’ve been going to for 3 years now. My last landlady sold her apartment. Does that mean I have to switch parishes?
Or the 10th amendment. We apparently don’t need States because the Fed Attorney General or Justices will impose their opinions if the states vote for something they don’t like.
I don’t think church shopping has anything to do with it. Birth control has become considered to be, not optional, but “what responsible, good people do,” and anyone who says otherwise is considered a kook. If your religion tells you otherwise and you don’t pay any attention, you’re normal. If you do pay attention, you’re a kook. That’s it. No one pays any attention to the religious liberty part because they think being against contraception is like being against automobiles or central heating — too nuts to take into consideration. I know, because I used to think that too. It takes a long time to unthink it.
Father.. I heard a snipet that the ‘Hobby Lobby’ case was getting close to the Supreme Court… will that ruling have an effect on all religious organizations and people?
I am both more hopeful and less dismissive of the rest of the American public. Can’t say that I agree with the title of the post – support for this attack on religious liberty isn’t “eroding”, I don’t think it was there in the first place. Democrats in the House would have debated the issue if they thought there was support for their position, and they did not. They created an imaginary protagonist for an imaginary issue that did not exist, and feigned imaginary outrage at imaginary scenarios which never happened, diverting attention AWAY from the issue at hand. At some point the issue of inadequate provisions for religious freedom have to be addressed, and the real issues have to be put in front of the public.