The Catholic Church is in a snit, again. This time it is because of the ruling by the Obama administration that they, like any other employer, must provide health insurance that offers free contraceptives to employees.
I think Kevin Drum has the right response, saying, “I guess I’m tired of religious groups operating secular enterprises (hospitals, schools), hiring people of multiple faiths, serving the general public, taking taxpayer dollars — and then claiming that deeply held religious beliefs should exempt them from public policy.”
He also points out that such calls for special exemptions only seem to apply to some religions, saying “If we’d been talking about, say, an Islamic hospital insisting that its employees bind themselves to sharia law, I imagine the “religious community” in the United States would be a wee bit more understanding if the Obama administration refused to condone the practice.”
If the Roman Catholic church hates to have the government tell it what to do, it can stop taking government money and engaging in secular enterprises. That’ll fix everything.
Oh, no!! The RCC not taking government money any more? But, but… They’d have to engage in competitive capitalism, then! And the Pope’s condemned that too!
(But he didn’t frown on the Church wanted its bread buttered on both sides, obviously.)
The RCC in spite of all of its foibles has been doing what is now called “secular” work for many years. I was born in a rural Catholic hospital though I am not Catholic. I suppose that a nun was the first person on earth to wipe my behind. We were a poor family and were it not for the hospital I suppose I would have been born without the advantage of trained people to deliver me. This is not the end of the world I know since most of the world’s babies are born at home but what would have happened if there had been a problem like when one of my brothers was stillborn? Is the Catholic church not allowed to think freely or have an opinion not dictated by the government? This seems to contradict much of what you blahg about. The oligarchy is now deciding whether or not you have to pay for contraception and abortion, why no protest of the overweening power grab of the oligarchy?
BTW: I really liked the advertisement showing Herman Cain giving a thumbs up in support of Newt. Does this mean you have changed your politics or are you just willing to take advertising revenue no matter the source? Also the stop abortion petition add is nice and of course this would not be complete without the big old juicy sirloin steak in support of the beef industry.
Just saying
In a world with over 7 billion people, the Catholic war on contraception looks increasingly short sighted.
In countries where large families have gone out of fashion due increased opportunities for women, the church is losing members. Without ignorance and squalor there is less pressing need for the church. Like Mother Theresa the church has a vested interest in misery and a fresh supply of ignorant followers. They have their morality backwards. Sex is not immoral but having unwanted children certainly is.
They do not have the right to impose their warped morality on employees who are not necessarily Catholic.
Ahhh, a perfect example of the Catholic Church’s inability to catch-up in a modern society complete with a president trying to base policy decisions on research, rather than scriptural interpretation or dogmatism.
The Catholic Church has every right to think freely -- on its own dime.
You were born in a Catholic hospital; my mother almost died because a Catholic doctor, working for the government, violated her right to make her own reproductive decisions when she requested a tubal after her 5th child. When she got pregnant again (while on contraception), the SAME DOCTOR bawled her out for getting pregnant, even though he refused to give her the choice before. This doctor, by the way, worked for the naval hospital, and had every right to think freely, but has NO RIGHT to deny others their right to think freely. If he didn’t want to prescribe the medicine a woman needed, or do the surgery she was in her rights to request, he should simply select another field of endeavor, or another employer.
Where I live, there are 3 cities, each with a hospital, each about an hour apart. There are a myriad of other small towns that rely on these hospitals; some of these towns are hours away. Only one of these hospitals is not Catholic; people are not able to use the hospital in their city, but must drive a long distance to get services, not just contraception but fertility, that they are legally entitled to receive. Many hospitals have been taken over by Catholics, who then possess the only hospital in town, and feel free to exercise their tyranny over the entire citizenry of the area. By the way, the area I live in is NOT majority Catholic. So the rest of us are expected to be bound by their medieval ideas, and the government is saying enough. I agree. You choose to open a hospital, you choose to provide services. No more discussion.