Support Choice?

Bill Mattocks

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I hear a lot about choice in women's reproductive choices. And I agree. My own personal or religious opinions don't matter; I may vote my conscience, including those based on my religious preferences and the morals I was raised with, but I support a woman's right to choose, and I support the law of the land. Abortion is legal, birth control is legal, and in general, I'm OK with it. I would never condemn a woman for making or having made that choice. Life is difficult, it's not my job to make anyone's life harder. As the saying goes, if you don't like abortions, don't have one.

Fair enough! So tell me, when the Catholic Church, which doesn't approve of birth control, is ordered to provide contraceptive services to its employees by the federal government, is that OK?

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57368259-503544/catholics-hear-anti-obama-letter-in-church/

During church services on Sunday, Catholics around the country were read a blistering letter assailing the Obama administration for an "assault on religious liberty" in the form of a coming requirement that most church-linked organizations - among them hospitals, schools and universities - offer birth control coverage as part of their health care plans.
Despite strong lobbying from religious groups, the Health and Human Services Department announced earlier this month that most church-linked groups will not be exempt from the requirements - which also mandate that no co-pay be charged for contraceptive services - though they will have an extra year to comply beyond the August 1 deadline.

The federal government has already done a lot of damage; in some US states, the Catholic Church provides social services as a free service to communities, but was ordered to provide services that it does not morally agree with; so it withdrew services. Those communities lose, because the federal government believes it can override a religion's right to believe what it wishes.

Now with this requirement, which the Catholic Church has stated flat-out that it will not comply with, it is quite likely that many Catholic services will simply close. Hospitals and other services; the federal government is asking us to do what we feel is not moral; no, strike that, they're demanding we do it.

Catholics may not agree with abortion or birth control; and many Catholics may vote that way, but no Catholic is compelled to obey church teaching. Many Catholics use birth control, no doubt many have abortions. Catholics also obey the law of the land; abortion is legal in the USA, regardless of how the Church feels about it.

But apparently, that freedom only goes one way. The Church has to respect the woman's right to choose; and the woman's right to choose trumps religious belief EVEN inside the Church.

Religious freedom? Never heard of it. Apparently.
 

ballen0351

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I disagree with the first part of your post but I agree 100% with the 2nd part.
 

granfire

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I see it a bit different...
BC is a cost saving measure.
Give the pill now or pay 10k and up for child birth...plus follow up measures.

However BC is most often not included in the healthcare plan, or only after pre-approval (Viagra on the other hand is available, go figure)

The Pill is often also a treatment for other girly things that ail us. Be it massive menstrual side effects, irregularities there of or plain ole bad skin. I am sure there are a few other things as well.

I call sexism.
It's against their believes to have extra marital relations, especially for priests, yet they pay for up to 3 kids with the mistress, as long as she keeps her mouth shut.
 

ballen0351

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It's against their believes to have extra marital relations, especially for priests, yet they pay for up to 3 kids with the mistress, as long as she keeps her mouth shut.

Huh whos paying for 3 kids? You lost me
 

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Bill, I'd agree with you for any organization that is considered part of the Church. As soon as an org is removed from the Church enough that they are not able to only hire Catholics, then they should not be treated any different. OTOH, I don't know why someone would get a job in an org that is closely tied to a religious org. I know I've passed on opportunities from Xtian based orgs solely based on that.
 

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Bill, I'd agree with you for any organization that is considered part of the Church. As soon as an org is removed from the Church enough that they are not able to only hire Catholics, then they should not be treated any different. OTOH, I don't know why someone would get a job in an org that is closely tied to a religious org. I know I've passed on opportunities from Xtian based orgs solely based on that.
That is no less idiotic than Indonesia, after it got devastated by the tsunami turning down aid freely offered by Israel, it's just a differently aimed bigotry...

I agree, how dare those Catholics provide employment and charity work? Bastards. They really should say F*** YOU all and quit charity in any nation that treats them as poorly as this one. They won't, but, the threat of it would stop this all together.
 

Carol

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I took my first paid broadcasting job working for the Christian Science Monitor's radio broadcast division. I was hired the day of Desert Storm. This was at the mother church of the First Church Of Christ, Scientist...where a core belief is prayer instead of medicine. I had been told that they were recently ordered to make health insurance available to employees. Was that OK? To me it was. I didn't have to be a Christian Scientist to work there. I appreciated having Blue Cross, prescription drugs, and a primary care doctor over a minister, the Bible, and Mary Baker Eddy's books.
 

CanuckMA

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That is no less idiotic than Indonesia, after it got devastated by the tsunami turning down aid freely offered by Israel, it's just a differently aimed bigotry...

No, my beliefs were just not compatible with theirs.

I agree, how dare those Catholics provide employment and charity work? Bastards. They really should say F*** YOU all and quit charity in any nation that treats them as poorly as this one. They won't, but, the threat of it would stop this all together.

Refer to Carol's post as well. As soon as you have employees that are not of the same faith, you shouls have to provide benefits aimed at the greater society.
 
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Bill Mattocks

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I see it a bit different...
BC is a cost saving measure.
Give the pill now or pay 10k and up for child birth...plus follow up measures.

However BC is most often not included in the healthcare plan, or only after pre-approval (Viagra on the other hand is available, go figure)

The Pill is often also a treatment for other girly things that ail us. Be it massive menstrual side effects, irregularities there of or plain ole bad skin. I am sure there are a few other things as well.

I call sexism.
It's against their believes to have extra marital relations, especially for priests, yet they pay for up to 3 kids with the mistress, as long as she keeps her mouth shut.

It's not really about birth control, per se. It's about forcing a religious institution that is against birth control to provide it to its employees, against its own beliefs.
 
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Bill Mattocks

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Bill, I'd agree with you for any organization that is considered part of the Church. As soon as an org is removed from the Church enough that they are not able to only hire Catholics, then they should not be treated any different. OTOH, I don't know why someone would get a job in an org that is closely tied to a religious org. I know I've passed on opportunities from Xtian based orgs solely based on that.

Part of the mandate of the Church is to help the poor and to cure the sick. The Catholic Church (and others) do that with private (non-government) social services and hospitals. However, these church-affiliated institutions are still just that; church-affiliated. That means they adhere to the moral values of the church. The federal government has always given exemptions to religious institutions on that basis; the government chose to keep the wall between Church and State. However, the Obama Administration has decided to break that down. The federal government is requiring the Catholic Church (and other religious organizations) to make birth control and abortions available to its employees, in violation of the Church's own policies and beliefs.

As you said, no one has to work for such an organization, whether or not they are Catholic. I could certainly understand a person saying "Gee, I don't want to work for an organization that won't provide me with birth control as part of my health benefits. I will work someplace else instead." Yay, good for them, I totally get it. This is forcing the Church to do what it believes is morally wrong.
 
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Bill Mattocks

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That is no less idiotic than Indonesia, after it got devastated by the tsunami turning down aid freely offered by Israel, it's just a differently aimed bigotry...

I agree, how dare those Catholics provide employment and charity work? Bastards. They really should say F*** YOU all and quit charity in any nation that treats them as poorly as this one. They won't, but, the threat of it would stop this all together.

Sadly, this is starting to happen in the USA. And I know that most on MT favor same-sex marriage, so I'll just say this; Catholic charities in several states where they have provided adoption services and foster care have been ordered to place children in same-sex families and have refused to do so, as it is against Church teachings. This came to loggerheads and the end result was that the Church has closed their adoption agencies and foster care facilities in those states. The losers are the children, of course, and I feel very badly about that. But the states that forced the Church to do this put them in an untenable position. Either do something they believe to be morally wrong, or stop providing those services. They chose to stop providing those services. Now those states are sucking wind because they don't have the budgets to pick up the slack that the Church provided as a service to the community. Everybody loses because the state insisted that the Catholic Church place orphans with gay couples.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/15/illinois-catholic-chariti_n_1093649.html

"The Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act only passed after specific assurances that the law would not impact the work of religious social service agencies," Breen said. "Specific protections for these agencies were written into the law, but unfortunately, Illinois officials refused to abide by those protections."

Earlier this year, the state moved to cancel $30.6 million worth of contracts with the charities because they were not following state non-discrimination laws in denying adoption and foster care placements for couples entered into the state's newly-approved civil union law. The charities -- in Peoria, Joliet, Springfield and Bellville -- argued that they shouldn't be forced to place children in families whose lives don't align with Catholic teaching, namely unmarried couples.

Regardless of where one stands on the issue of same-sex marriage, religious freedom exists also. It is "OK" for a religion to believe that same-sex marriage is not acceptable and to see it as immoral; no one is forced to believe that, it's just what the Church and the Faithful believe. The Church provides social services as part of its mandate to help the poor and downtrodden as it has since the beginning, but the State insists that the Church violate its own principles in order to continue to do so. Everybody loses.
 

elder999

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Institutions like Catholic hospitals, while founded and funded by the Catholic church, usually have a corporate structure completely separate from the Church, and corporate governance that often has no Church officials or clerics on board. As such, this is not "forcing the Church to do what it believes is morally wrong," which providing insurance coverage for is a bit of a stretch, morally speaking, anyway-just because I have insurance that covers abortions, for example,certainly doesn't mean that I'm ever going to have occasion to use it.:lol:

On the other hand, moral decisions are an individual choice. Where abortions might save the life of the mother, why shouldn't insurance be able to cover that. Likewise, the pill is prescribed for a variety of things besides contraception, and, in cases of rape, while the "morning after pill" can certainly provide peace of mind to a traumatized woman, there really could be no certainty of its having prevented pregnancy, anymore than there could be of pregnancy having occurred- on the morning after, at any rate.

On the other hand, if the Church itself had to provide such insurance to its non-clerical employees, that would be another matter altogether, and your position would have merit. In light of the law of the land, though-which itself may prove to be unconstitutional for other reasons such institutions have no choice in the matter, and, yes, sadly may choose to cease providing their services, rather than comply. Yay, good for them; I totally get it.
 

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It's not really about birth control, per se. It's about forcing a religious institution that is against birth control to provide it to its employees, against its own beliefs.

Like I said, it's hypocrisy. The church does not believe in priests meddling around either, but yet pay for up to three of those results, as long as everybody keeps their mouths shut.

Years back in Germany there was a big outcry of some kind or another about church run preschool facilities...well, all nice and dandy, until you look at how much (or little) the church actually contributed: 11%, as in ELEVEN.

Not impressed.
At all.

The church does not believe in a lot of things but gives them a pass anyhow.
BC in this day and age, really?
 
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Bill Mattocks

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Institutions like Catholic hospitals, while founded and funded by the Catholic church, usually have a corporate structure completely separate from the Church, and corporate governance that often has no Church officials or clerics on board. As such, this is not "forcing the Church to do what it believes is morally wrong," which providing insurance coverage for is a bit of a stretch, morally speaking, anyway-just because I have insurance that covers abortions, for example,certainly doesn't mean that I'm ever going to have occasion to use it.:lol:

On the other hand, moral decisions are an individual choice. Where abortions might save the life of the mother, why shouldn't insurance be able to cover that. Likewise, the pill is prescribed for a variety of things besides contraception, and, in cases of rape, while the "morning after pill" can certainly provide peace of mind to a traumatized woman, there really could be no certainty of its having prevented pregnancy, anymore than there could be of pregnancy having occurred- on the morning after, at any rate.

On the other hand, if the Church itself had to provide such insurance to its non-clerical employees, that would be another matter altogether, and your position would have merit. In light of the law of the land, though-which itself may prove to be unconstitutional for other reasons such institutions have no choice in the matter, and, yes, sadly may choose to cease providing their services, rather than comply. Yay, good for them; I totally get it.

That's not correct, and I can provide direct evidence of it. My wife's uncle was president of a major Catholic university in NYC for nearly 30 years; he is a priest. I don't think you could tell him that the university was not under the direct control and supervision of the Catholic Church.

There are certainly hospitals and other organizations in which governance has passed from Catholic to lay supervision and direction, and in those circumstances, the Church is currently in the process of disassociating itself from those institutions; which is entirely appropriate. And in such cases, I agree that the Church has no say in what kind of health care they provide employees. To wit:

http://www.chausa.org/Catholic_Healthcare_West_reorganizes_governance.aspx

Catholic Healthcare West has reorganized its governance structure and changed its name to Dignity Health. Under the new governance model the San Francisco-based operating company is no longer an official ministry of the Catholic Church. The company, which operates 40 hospitals in three states, also announced its intent to build a national health care system rooted in the Catholic tradition with both Catholic and other-than-Catholic components and partnerships.

I am referring to institutions which ARE an 'official ministry of the Catholic Church', and as such are under the direct moral, spiritual, and day-to-day governance of the Church. This is no different than any religious institution. And in fact, in an article in Politico this morning, President Obama acknowledged that there is a provision sheltering religious organizations from this birth control health insurance requirement, but he has intentionally decided not to honor it. Plain and simple, he's picking a fight for the purposes of his re-election campaign.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0212/72345.html

The president’s tone was polite but not contrite, a person briefed on the calls told POLITICO: He explained that while his health care law exempted Catholic churches from the requirement, he wouldn’t carve out other Catholic institutions even though the Vatican views artificial birth control as contrary to the will of God.

This is all about his re-election. And the losers are those who seek to follow their own moral guidance based on their own faith.
 

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This is still really much ado about nothing, Bill-Jehovah`s Witnesses and Christian Scientists have been forced by the government to provide medical care in direct contravention of "their own moral guidance based on their own faith" on numerous occasions over the years. Was it right? I don't know-I know it probably didn't feel right to the people involved.

Again, just because an institution has to provide insurance, doesn't mean that they're culpable in how that insurance is used, or even that it will be used in that way.


And I've been saying for years what an *** Obama is, and this proves it-he's probably determined that he doesn't need the Catholic vote, or wasn't going to get it-because if he was, this will lose it for him-though this will be a popuar decision with his base, as students at Catholic schools like Fordham will be able to get contraception through their university health plan.
 
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Bill Mattocks

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This is still really much ado about nothing, Bill-Jehovah`s Witnesses and Christian Scientists have been forced by the government to provide medical care in direct contravention of "their own moral guidance based on their own faith" on numerous occasions over the years. Was it right? I don't know-I know it probably didn't feel right to the people involved.

Again, just because an institution has to provide insurance, doesn't mean that they're culpable in how that insurance is used, or even that it will be used in that way.


And I've been saying for years what an *** Obama is, and this proves it-he's probably determined that he doesn't need the Catholic vote, or wasn't going to get it-because if he was, this will lose it for him-though this will be a popuar decision with his base, as students at Catholic schools like Fordham will be able to get contraception through their university health plan.

I don't think it is much ado about nothing. It is certainly 'something' for Catholics who follow Church precepts. To wit:

http://www.fordham.edu/campus_resou...tudent_health_servi/medical_services_1524.asp

Women's Health care: Women's Health Care services are available for all female students at the Rose Hill and Lincoln Center campuses five days per week by appointment. Services include routine gynecological examinations, pap smears, sexual transmitted infections testing, and pregnancy testing. Treatment and related counseling are confidential and always offered in a non-judgmental manner.

Neither contraceptives nor birth control are distributed or prescribed on premises as a standard practice. Student Health Services does make limited exceptions for the treatment of medical conditions accompanied by supporting documentation. There is a nominal charge for GYN exams, and associated laboratory fees are the responsibility of the student. Discounted rates are available if students do not have private insurance (please contact the office for a fee schedule).

So what this new requirement will do is this. The Church says "We do not believe in contraception." A student (actually this applies to employees, not students, but let's just say) comes in and says "I want contraceptives." The clinic says "The Church teaches against contraception and we are a Catholic organization. But here you go." An employee of a Catholic organization says "I want an abortion and I want the Catholic Church to pay for it." The Church says "We are against abortion, but here you go. And we'll use Catholic donations to pay for it."

Much ado about nothing? For non-Catholics, I can see that. For believing Catholics, it's very much something. A core belief that the government is forcing them to go against.

And as you said; and I agree; this isn't about anything in the core set of Democratic beliefs here. This is about election-year politics. So Catholics have to eat **** so Obama can play a weird strategy. Yeah, that sits well.
 

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What other aspects of labor law does this "faith exemption" cover when the church runs a business? Mandatory reporter laws (apropos, that), overtime pay, child labor laws? Religious freedom is not license to ignore the laws governing public businesses, which the hospitals certainly are. If it where, then church-affiliated businesses become lawless zones as long as a faith-based argument can be provided - which we know is not the case. If I run a deli and my faith instructs me that gays are sinful, am I allowed to excluded gays from employment or service in my deli? Nope, not at all. My religious freedom is not being impinged upon either - I am free to think whatever I want as long as my public business follows the law.
 
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Bill Mattocks

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What other aspects of labor law does this "faith exemption" cover when the church runs a business? Mandatory reporter laws (apropos, that), overtime pay, child labor laws? Religious freedom is not license to ignore the laws governing public businesses, which the hospitals certainly are. If it where, then church-affiliated businesses become lawless zones as long as a faith-based argument can be provided - which we know is not the case. If I run a deli and my faith instructs me that gays are sinful, am I allowed to excluded gays from employment or service in my deli? Nope, not at all. My religious freedom is not being impinged upon either - I am free to think whatever I want as long as my public business follows the law.

To the best of my knowledge, it is not considered a religious tenet by the Catholic that people be paid a certain amount of money. In any case, it's not in question here. This is about the Church being forced to provide insurance coverage for abortion and contraceptive services to its employees, against the teachings of the Church.
 

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First, if you try to set up a christmas tree outside of city hall, there is apparently an adamantium wall between church and state and the atheist zealots see the inquisition around the corner. With a policy that will impact millions of people around the country there is apparently a paper thin wall between church and state.

Next, the real problem is that people have become used to the government being able to tell a private organization what they have to provide for health care, and that they are telling private insurance companies what they have to cover as part of their insurance plans. That is the whole underlying problem and that needs to be addressed.
 

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