Monday, February 13, 2012

Update . . . worth reading

As the whole contraception/reproductive technology conflict continues, what is most troublesome is the way that the current administration defines the nature of the religious liberty enshrined in the Bill of Rights.  As I have long said, it is a protection of the right to worship and not necessarily a right of religion (as the administration defines it).

So in the case of Hosanna-Tabor before the SCOTUS, the administration came down against the church.  Its point was that there are reasons to abridge the rights of religious institutions when the interests of the state are above the right itself -- in this case requiring the church to observe rules of discrimination established by the government in the church's employment of those to whom it entrusts ministerial responsibility.

So in the case of the health care/abortion/contraception issues, only the explicit place of worship is defined as church and all other activities of the church fall under the domain of an ordinary employer, subject to the ordinary rules of law.  The extent of such redefinition of the right of religious freedom has great consequences for the future -- should this line of reasoning be continued.

Charles Krauthammer has reviewed the specific definition of church which is the working rule of HHS and Secretary Sebelius (herself a Roman Catholic, I believe) and how this new definition explicitly excludes all but the house of worship itself from the realm of church and its protection under the Bill of Rights.

Read it for yourself here...

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Like you, I am frustrated by the plethora of half-truths and lies coming from the media and I would add, the executive branch.

I would offer a link to some other good articles. Please don't miss the one about the bogus 98% of Catholic Women using contraceptives. As Mark Twain quipped: there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. We are living in an era in danger of being smothered by them:

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2012/02/13/first-links-2-13-12

Warm regards,
Susan

Anonymous said...

The lst Amendment is clear:
"Congress must not interfere with
freedom of religion. Congress shall
make no law respecting the establish-
ment of religion or prohibiting the
free exercise thereof."

The executive branch is interfering
as a spokesman for congress as it
pertains to our free exercise of
religion. Once we lose the freedom
of religion, democracy is over.

Anonymous said...

Kathleen Sebellius is a Catholic in name only. She is one of the hand-picked Catholic liberals in the Obama administration.

I think Obama is finding out that he has badly miscalculated what he has wrought.

I would proud to hear a fellow Catholic state on 60 Minutes that he is a Catholic first, a Democrat second and he would not be supporting Obama after this fiasco.

Christine

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Janis Williams said...

It is not an impossible leap in reasoning to think the church will eventually again be sanctuary. Sanctuary in the medieval sense where a person accused of a crime (guilty or not) could come to the church building for a time of respite from prosecution.

Then again, with the current trend, there will be NO sanctuary anywhere, even for the crime of wanting to keep (not abort) a child not considered profitable to the government.

Anonymous said...

Yikes, I meant "I WAS proud"

Christine

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Anonymous said...

Also, when The Washington Post defends Catholics and other Christians, time to break out a Te Deum.

Christine