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August 1, 2012- Obamacare contraception mandate takes effect
Excerpt:
Religious freedom advocates have been distraught by the requirement to cover contraceptive services, as some religions, notably the Catholic Church, have beliefs that conflict with the mandate.
HHS contends that certain non-profit religious organizations such as churches and schools are not required to cover the services. Non-exempt employers that have religious objections, which do not comply will be penalized. According to the Congressional Research Service employers who do not comply could be hit with a federal tax of $100 per-day-per-employee.
*snip*
“The implementation of this policy [Wednesday] marks the beginning of the end of religious freedom in our nation,” added Christen Varley, executive director of Conscience Cause a non-profit faith advocacy organization, in a statement. “Starting [Wednesday], employers with religious and moral objections must make an unimaginable choice: comply and deny your faith, or resist and be subject to crippling fines. Religious institutions have been given an absurd one year reprieve in which to decide the same.
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Related to Obama's war on religious liberty, Cardinal George, of the Archdiocese of Chicago, former head of the United States Council of Catholic Bishops, issued this statement after overlord Rahm Emanuel's inflammatory, idiotic rebukes of Chick-Fil-A CEO's personal beliefs.
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Sunday, July 29, 2012
Reflections on “Chicago values”
Comments (90)
Recent comments by those who administer our city seem to assume that the city government can decide for everyone what are the “values” that must be held by citizens of Chicago. I was born and raised here, and my understanding of being a Chicagoan never included submitting my value system to the government for approval.
Must those whose personal values do not conform to those of the government of the day move from the city? Is the City Council going to set up a “Council Committee on Un-Chicagoan Activities” and call those of us who are suspect to appear before it? I would have argued a few days ago that I believe such a move is, if I can borrow a phrase, “un-Chicagoan.”
The value in question is espousal of “gender-free marriage.” Approval of state-sponsored homosexual unions has very quickly become a litmus test for bigotry; and espousing the understanding of marriage that has prevailed among all peoples throughout human history is now, supposedly, outside the American consensus. Are Americans so exceptional that we are free to define “marriage” (or other institutions we did not invent) at will? What are we re-defining?
It might be good to put aside any religious teaching and any state laws and start from scratch, from nature itself, when talking about marriage. Marriage existed before Christ called together his first disciples two thousand years ago and well before the United States of America was formed two hundred and thirty six years ago. Neither Church nor state invented marriage, and neither can change its nature.
Marriage exists because human nature comes in two complementary sexes: male and female. The sexual union of a man and woman is called the marital act because the two become physically one in a way that is impossible between two men or two women. Whatever a homosexual union might be or represent, it is not physically marital. Gender is inextricably bound up with physical sexual identity; and “gender-free marriage” is a contradiction in terms, like a square circle.
Both Church and state do, however, have an interest in regulating marriage. It is not that religious marriage is private and civil marriage public; rather, marriage is a public institution in both Church and state. The state regulates marriage to assure stability in society and for the proper protection and raising of the next generation of citizens. The state has a vested interest in knowing who is married and who is not and in fostering good marriages and strong families for the sake of society.
The Church, because Jesus raised the marital union to the level of symbolizing his own union with his Body the Church, has an interest in determining which marital unions are sacramental and which are not. The Church sees married life as a path to sanctity and as the means for raising children in the faith, as citizens of the universal kingdom of God. These are all legitimate interests of both Church and state, but they assume and do not create the nature of marriage.
Jesus affirmed this understanding of marriage when he spoke of “two becoming one flesh” (Mt. 19: 4-6). Was Jesus a bigot? Could Jesus be accepted as a Chicagoan? Would Jesus be more “enlightened” if he had the privilege of living in our society? One is welcome to believe that, of course; but it should not become the official state religion, at least not in a land that still fancies itself free. Surely there must be a way to properly respect people who are gay or lesbian without using civil law to undermine the nature of marriage.
Surely we can find a way not to play off newly invented individual rights to “marriage” against constitutionally protected freedom of religious belief and religious practice. The State’s attempting to redefine marriage has become a defining moment not for marriage, which is what it is, but for our increasingly fragile “civil union” as citizens.
Francis Cardinal George, OMI
Archbishop of Chicago
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God help us fight the reprehensible tyrants.
..Ping!
Lie down with dogs; rise up with fleas. Anybody who accepts government funding in any form will find that he is no longer his own master. The worst thing that happened to freedom in this country was when government essentially took over education. It was all downhill from there.
Catholics have only themselves to blame. They vote Democrat.
If they abide by the Bible, they know that “we ought to obey God rather than man.” There is no room for compromise.
He's not a muslime. /s
http://iwf.org/blog/2788680/Infographic:-The-HHS-Mandate
When Otto von Bismarck launched his Kulturkampf against Catholic Church institutions --- moved to knock down the Catholic school system, instituted "civil marriage" laws and tried to force the Church to comply ----half of the Prussian bishops ended up in prison or in exile, 1800 parish priests were imprisoned or exiled, and thousands of laypeople were imprisoned for helping the priests.
Obama's Kulturkampf --- well, we'll see.