Obama’s Unconscionable Attack on Religious Freedom

Details: 03 February 2012

On Friday, Jan. 20, the Obama Administration leveled a direct and unprecedented attack on religion and First Amendment rights. Dismissing the pleas of Catholic and non-Catholic religious leaders and institutions, Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, issued a regulatory mandate forcing all health insurance plans to pay for sterilizations and contraceptive drugs and devices, including those that can cause abortions.

Cardinal-elect Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York City and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said "[t]o 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."

In a Jan. 25 Wall Street Journal editorial, Cardinal-elect Dolan cited the fierce defense our nation’s Founding Fathers gave to religious liberty, presenting it as the first freedom in the Bill of Rights.

His Eminence cited George Washington who said this: "The conscientious scruples of all men should be treated with great delicacy and tenderness; and it is my wish and desire, that the laws may always be extensively accommodated to them." And James Madison, who authored the First Amendment, said: "Conscience is the most sacred of all property."

His Eminence also pointed out the bitter irony that the Obama Administration issued its edict only two weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court "unanimously and enthusiastically reaffirmed these longstanding and foundational principles of religious freedom" in its Hosanna-Tabor ruling. "The court made clear that they include the right of religious institutions to control their internal affairs."

The Obama Administration’s attack on religious liberty will and must be fought vigorously. Even many non-Catholic religious leaders and institutions that may not share Catholic teaching on contraception are weighing in.

As Cardinal-elect Dolan said in his editorial, "Americans of other faiths, or no faith at all… recognize that their beliefs could be next on the block. They also recognize that the cleverest way for the government to erode the broader principle of religious freedom is to target unpopular beliefs first."

In addition to fighting this attack on religious liberty, we must also fight the Obama Administration’s radical ideology which views pregnancy as a disease and contraception as preventive "healthcare." This view, that wider and easier access to contraception will reduce unintended pregnancies and abortions, is simply baseless.

First, the Guttmacher Institute (which has ties to Planned Parenthood) acknowledges that more than half of women seeking abortion in the United States are using contraception in the month they become pregnant. Guttmacher’s explanation: "because women who are using contraceptives are motivated to prevent an unplanned birth, they are more likely than women who were not using contraceptives to seek an abortion should they accidentally become pregnant."

Second, dozens of studies conducted by those who were trying to prove that contraception reduces unintended pregnancy and abortion found this not to be the case. For example, James Trussell, who originated the claim that easier access to emergency contraception could "result in a greater than 50% reduction in abortion rates" has conceded that 23 published studies from 10 countries disprove his claim. According to every one of the 23 studies, published between 1998 and 2006, easier access to emergency contraception fails to achieve any statistically significant reduction in rates of unintended pregnancy and abortion.

Our bishops are asking us to pray and do penance that the Obama Administration’s attack on religious freedom will be reversed. They also urge us to contact our members of Congress to protest this outrage and to insist on the passage of the "Respect for Rights of Conscience Act."

Nebraskans are fortunate that Congressman Jeff Fortenberry introduced this Act in the House (H.R. 1179) and Congressmen Lee Terry and Adrian Smith co-sponsored it. And both of our Senators, Mike Johanns and Ben Nelson, have co-sponsored the Senate version of the Act (S. 1467). Please thank them and urge them to do everything possible to get this critical policy enacted.

You can contact Greg at The Nebraska Catholic Conference, 215 Centennial Mall South Suite 310, Lincoln, NE 68508; This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.