LifeNet

EWTN's Catholic Action Insight interview with Cardinal Raymond Burke

This interview was on EWTN earlier today.

Hit this link for the entire video, posted on the Catholic Action website.

Thomas McKenna interviewing Cardinal Burke

In the interview, Cardinal Burke addresses why a Catholic employer cannot, and should not be expected to, provide health care insurance that includes contraception and sterilization. He explains how this would be not only material cooperation in the sin, but also formal cooperation and for that reason there is no way to justify this implementation.

NY City Rally for Religious Freedom - a big success!

500 enthusiastic people of all ages and backgrounds were there, below the statue of George Washington at the Federal Hall National Memorial at 26 Wall Street.

Of course, this was only one of 140 Rallies nationwide.

FOX was the only television news at the Rally.

You can read about coverage in the local Journal News here Hundreds rally on Wall St. over contraception rule, claim attack on religion including 16 photos

In USA Today Religious rallies across USA protest birth-control mandate

In the Washington Post Social conservatives hope for renewed fervor in contraceptive controversies

No coverage in the NY Times. None. Nada. Didn't happen.

We will post more material from the Rally over the next couple of days.

Here are two short videos to give some sense of the flavor of the day.

The speakers have no sound system, so you have to listen carefully as Dr. Anne Nulte ends her brief talk, pointing out that the drug companies do not fully disclose the dangers of hormonal birth control pills. Then the facilitator of the event, Fr. Augustino, CFR, suggests the crowd sing "Amazing Grace."

 

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound ...

Planning starts for Rally against HHS Mandate attack on religious freedom and conscience

First plan is for March 23rd, nationwide.

Stand up for Religious Freedom

More information as it becomes available.

Evangelical Pastor Rick Warren: "I'd rather go to jail than obey mandate"

Rick Warren is the author of the worldwide best seller The Purpose Driven Life and Pastor of Saddleback Church.

He gave the invocation at the Obama inauguration.

Here's Warren's commentary on the HHS mandate -

“I’m not a Catholic but I stand in 100% solidarity with my brothers & sisters to practice their belief against govt pressure,” Warren said. “I’d go to jail rather than cave in to a govement mandate that violates what God commands us to do. Would you? Acts 5:29.”

Richard Land, a pro-life leader who is a top official with the South Baptist Church, said the same thing the day prior.

“When it comes to abortifacients, and many birth-control methods are abortifacients,” Land said, this mandate is “reprehensible in its demands for people to violate their conscience.” “We are not going to do this. We have a First Amendment right to freedom of conscience, and we’re going to defend it. If we have to defend it by going to jail, so be it.”

Rev. Matthew Harrison is another Protestant leader who is opposed to the mandate.

“We have a full-tilt assault on religion, especially full creedal Christians, right now,” he said. “This is a fundamental attack on the Roman Catholic Church’s ability to be in the public square, being in partnership with the government providing for the needy.”

He says the “ultimate goal is to drive religious people out of public life in this nation and out of the reception of any kind of funding or partnership with government for good in society.”

Harrison is 100% right!

The Administration launches a direct attack on Catholic - and other - Churches, and on the primacy of conscience

UPDATE: Even the normally Democratic Party lap dog National Catholic Reporter (NCR) is outraged. NCR - UPDATED: White House refuses to expand conscience exemption

Mandates that contraceptives and abortifacients must be provided in employer health plans with no opt out for conscientious objection.

This is from the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops (USCCB)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                             JANUARY 20, 2012

 

U.S. BISHOPS VOW TO FIGHT HHS EDICT

 

Unconscionable to force citizens to buy contraceptives against their will

No change in limited exemption, only delay in enforcement

Matter of freedom of conscience, freedom of religion

 

WASHINGTON—The Catholic bishops of the United States called “literally unconscionable” a decision by the Obama Administration to continue to demand that sterilization, abortifacients  and contraception be included in virtually all health plans. Today's announcement means that this mandate and its very narrow exemption will not change at all; instead there will only be a delay in enforcement against some employers.

            “In effect, the president is saying we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences,” said Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan, archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

            The cardinal-designate continued, “To force American citizens to choose between violating their consciences and forgoing their healthcare is literally unconscionable.  It is as much an attack on access to health care as on religious freedom. Historically this represents a challenge and a compromise of our religious liberty."

            The HHS rule requires that sterilization and contraception – including controversial abortifacients – be included among “preventive services” coverage in almost every healthcare plan available to Americans. “The government should not force Americans to act as if pregnancy is a disease to be prevented at all costs,” added Cardinal-designate Dolan.

            At issue, the U.S. bishops and other religious leaders insist, is the survival of a cornerstone constitutionally protected freedom that ensures respect for the conscience of Catholics and all other Americans.

            “This is nothing less than a direct attack on religion and First Amendment rights,” said Franciscan Sister Jane Marie Klein, chairperson of the board at Franciscan Alliance, Inc., a system of 13 Catholic hospitals. “I have hundreds of employees who will be upset and confused by this edict. I cannot understand it at all.”

            Daughter of Charity Sister Carol Keehan, president and chief executive officer of the Catholic Health Association of the United States, voiced disappointment with the decision. Catholic hospitals serve one out of six people who seek hospital care annually.

            “This was a missed opportunity to be clear on appropriate conscience protection,” Sister Keehan said.

            Cardinal-designate Dolan urged that the HHS mandate be overturned.

            “The Obama administration has now drawn an unprecedented line in the sand,” he said. “The Catholic bishops are committed to working with our fellow Americans to reform the law and change this unjust regulation. We will continue to study all the implications of this troubling decision.”

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First Amendment, heath care, Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Freedom of Conscience, U.S. bishops, United States Conference of Catholic bishops, President Obama, Sister Carol Keehan

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New video from Catholicvote.org

Religious freedom

 

Pro-life win in Europe: conscience protections upheld for healthcare workers

This is from the Irish website, Faith & Life

A concerted effort to force European doctors to perform abortions in violation of their consciences has been comprehensively defeated at the Council of Europe.

Addressing the Assembly, Senator Mullen reminded the members that the rights of unborn children are recognised by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. He pointed out that “[t]here is no such thing as a human right to abortion, nor has any text ever indicated such a right. However, it is a basic principle of human rights law that all human beings without exception have a range of rights including that of conscientious objection.”

Addressing Mrs McCafferty, Senator Mullen said, “I will support you when you seek measures to support women who are unhappily pregnant, so that they do not feel that their only option is abortion. I will take the lead, speaking as a man and as a legislator, in ensuring that our societies are welcoming and supportive at all times. But what I cannot do is join you in what is, in effect, the furtherance of a pro-abortion agenda, because, contrary to what it claims, the report is not about ensuring that all women receive necessary medical care in pregnancy.”

He drew attention to the fact that those consulted in the preparation of the report are self-confessed abortion advocates. The Senator concluded by referring to the increasing reluctance of doctors to involve themselves with abortion. “That is why I suggest that this report has been produced. Instead of smelling the cultural coffee, Mrs McCafferty and her allies are seeking to batten down the hatches and create internationally binding obligations, even as people in individual societies are becoming more uncomfortable about abortion and seeking more life-affirming alternatives.”

The final resolution urged that “No person, hospital or institution shall be coerced, held liable or discriminated against in any manner because of a refusal to perform, accommodate, assist or submit to an abortion, the performance of a human miscarriage, or euthanasia or any act which could cause the death of a human foetus or embryo, for any reason.”

In the end, McCafferty and other pro-abortion members voted against the amended report rather than affirm life and fundamental human rights. Among those lobbying for a clampdown on freedom of conscience were the pro-abortion groups Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and ‘Catholics’ for Choice.

In California, important legal case developing over health care providers who refuse to perform abortions

The state of California is seeking to invalidate a federal law which seeks to protect institutions and caregivers who refuse to participate in abortions. This law is of major importance to. amongst others, the Catholic healthcare system in California.

Court Rules Pro-Life Groups Can Join Abortion Conscience Clause Case

Excerpts:

President Bush signed a federal spending bill with a provision sponsored by pro-life Reps. Henry Hyde and Dave Weldon saying the federal government can't discriminate against doctors, hospitals or health insurance companies that do not want to perform or pay for abortions.

Any federal, state or local agency that receives federal money would lose those funds if they engage in such discrimination.

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer filed a lawsuit against the law in January 2005 and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday that the two pro-life groups can join in defending the law.

The court ruled the Alliance for Catholic Health Care and the Medical Groups, which represents health organizations opposing abortion, can help the federal government defend the provision in the case.

According to a Reuters report, it said the groups can participate because medical providers will be forced to choose between their moral beliefs and losing their jobs or medical licenses.

"Congress passed the Weldon Amendment precisely to keep doctors who have moral qualms about performing abortions from being put to the hard choice of acting in conformity with their beliefs, or risking imprisonment or loss of professional livelihood," Judge Alex Kozinski wrote for a three-judge panel of the appellate court.

Lockyer spokesman Tom Dresslar condemned the decision in an interview with Reuters.

"Regardless of who is to intervene in this case, the Weldon Amendment remains an unconstitutional infringement of California's sovereignty as well as a threat to the reproductive health care rights of the state's women," she claimed.

Weldon previously told the Sacramento Bee newspaper that his amendment "in no way infringes" on a woman's right to an abortion. Instead, Weldon said in a statement, it only says "you can't force the unwilling" to perform them.

"Mr. Lockyer seems anxious to preserve California's right to coerce such unwilling providers into performing abortions," Weldon said.

The California-based Alliance for Catholic Health Care represents nine Catholic health care systems that operate 59 Catholic and community-based affiliated hospitals. Together, Catholic health care providers comprise over 15 percent of California's hospitals.