Regarding the forced mandate to provide contraception, abortifacient drugs, and sterilization in Catholic health plans. I posted about it here.
But first, an apropos quote from Catholic priest, author and columnist, Fr. George Rutler - you can find the whole column here (thanks to my friend Antoinette for sending it to me!).
Since our Lord did not humiliate the frightened apostles by saying “I told you so” when he rose from the dead, I shall not say “I told you so” to any who, just three years ago, underestimated the plottings of social engineers whose audacity is only an audacity of hopelessness.
Now, here is Michael Gerson's column from the Washington Post a couple of days ago (Gerson is not a Catholic). Excerpts below the link, but hit the link; the whole excellent column is only 11 paragraphs.
Obama plays his Catholic allies for fools
... The religious exemption granted by Obamacare is narrower than anywhere else in federal law — essentially covering the delivery of homilies and the distribution of sacraments. Serving the poor and healing the sick are regarded as secular pursuits — a determination that would have surprised Christianity’s founder.
Both radicalism and maliciousness are at work in Obama’s decision — an edict delivered with a sneer. It is the most transparently anti-Catholic maneuver by the federal government since the Blaine Amendment was proposed in 1875 — a measure designed to diminish public tolerance of Romanism, then regarded as foreign, authoritarian and illiberal. Modern liberalism has progressed to the point of adopting the attitudes and methods of 19th-century Republican nativists.
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The implications of Obama’s power grab go further than contraception and will provoke opposition beyond Catholicism. Christian colleges and universities of various denominations will resist providing insurance coverage for abortifacients. And the astounding ambition of this federal precedent will soon be apparent to every religious institution. Obama is claiming the executive authority to determine which missions of believers are religious and which are not — and then to aggressively regulate institutions the government declares to be secular. It is a view of religious liberty so narrow and privatized that it barely covers the space between a believer’s ears.
Obama’s decision also reflects a certain view of liberalism. Classical liberalism was concerned with the freedom to hold and practice beliefs at odds with a public consensus. Modern liberalism uses the power of the state to impose liberal values on institutions it regards as backward. It is the difference between pluralism and anti-clericalism.
Gerson concludes "The war on religion is now formally declared".
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