From
NPR:
Despite a furious lobbying effort by the Catholic Church, the Obama administration today said it won't weaken new rules that will require most health insurance plans to offer women prescription contraceptives at no additional out-of-pocket cost.
The final version of the rules will give religious-based hospitals, universities, charities, and other organizations whose primary purpose is not religious, an additional year to come into compliance with the contraceptive requirement. Churches are exempt.
But even a face-to-face meeting in the Oval Office last November between President Obama and the head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops failed to change the administration's position to allow a broader exemption.
Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan's response:
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."
Cardinal-designate Dolan, if you want fewer abortions, in the name of heaven, stop complaining about persecution, follow the law, and allow employees of the Roman Catholic Church to have access to birth control in health insurance plans and RC hospitals.
Besides, from
another article at NPR:
But while some insist that the rules, which spring from last year's health law, break new ground, many states as well as federal civil rights law already require most religious employers to cover prescription contraceptives if they provide coverage of other prescription drugs.
While some religious employers take advantage of loopholes or religious exemptions, the fact remains that dozens of Catholic hospitals and universities currently offer contraceptive coverage as part of their health insurance packages.
"We've always had contraceptive birth control included in our health care benefits," said Michelle Michaud, a labor and delivery nurse at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz, Calif. "It's something that we've come to expect for ourselves and our family."
Cardinal-designate Dolan conveniently fails to acknowledge that access to contraceptives is already available in Roman Catholic health plans and hospitals. As to the descriptive 'unconscionable', it depends upon whose conscience is being violated. The decision by the Obama administration has nothing to do with religious liberty, but rather concerns women's equal treatment in health care. Roman Catholics and anyone else are completely at liberty to avoid the use of contraceptives. The issue is that the US will now insist on non-discriminatory rules for health care coverage. What Cardinal Dolan and the RC College of Bishops attempt is to impose their religious views on people who do not share their beliefs, and they need to stop or be stopped.
