Exclusive: U.S. bishops say they’re willing to ‘go to jail’ over HHS mandate

Life Site News ^ | January 29, 2013 | PATRICK B. CRAINE

[Salvation]

Amen!

[Salvation]

The Bishops need our prayers so that they know they aren’t fighting this alone!

[Salvation]

BTTT!

[Salvation]

Please stop the bashing and learn who the new Bishops are!

Yes, some of the older Bishops didn’t do the best job. But would your Bishop or minister be willing to go to jail too?

Please answer that question.

[Rashputin]

I remember Southern democrats laughing at Republicans for bringing up the Civil Rights Act over and over because even if it ever pased Jim Crow laws would stay quietly in court and no one would get excited about it or notice. They were positive that no loudmouthed black Baptist would ever win any sympathy from the public because it would all just be quiet Civil fines and legal maneuvers with various businesses sticking to their right to refuse service.

Half the problem is that Conservatives won't get masses of pissed off people in the streets but that's all the left understands.

Fortunately, I feel sure this will be different. There are more than a few Bishops who would very publicly lead demonstrations over those Civil fines and/or asset seizures, and I suspect the crowds supporting them will get very big, very fast. US media or not, the international media will have plenty of "photo ops" with Bishops, Priests, and little old ladies, being arrested or attacked by violent counter-demonstrators.

If history is any guide, though, millions of people who claim to be Conservative Christians will ignore the First Amendment implications and snicker at Catholics getting the shaft from the government. That's they what they did in the 1870s when the Catholic Church warned that public schools rather than a voucher system would lead to a secular, atheist, society where religion would be suppressed by the government.

[Salvation]

**I have no idea which, if any, bishops are actually willing to die for the faith.**

Hooray for them.

I always thought that killing was a criminal offense. The Bishops are willing to go to jail because the HHS mandate supports KILLING BABIES!

That’s a crime (MORTAL SIN) in God’s eyes, whether Roe v. Wade agrees or not.

[Salvation]

**I have no idea which, if any, bishops are actually willing to die for the faith.**

The article name three and mentions the one in Virginia, though not by name. Did you miss that?

[Salvation]

Would the Bishops of your denomination be willing to go to jail to protect the unborn?

I say Bravo for these three Bishops.

[Salvation]

Yes, the age of martyrs will be coming to the United States.

[Salvation]

The Civil War is a good analogy in this matter.

[Salvation]

So are you supporting Obama's legacy of abortion?

[inpajamas]

Choice A: Go to jail
Choice B: Go to Hell
Choice C: Both A and B
Choice D: Find a way to avoid A, B, and C

Choose wisely

[Biggirl]

So will a second civil war.

[cornelis]

Flashback to the time of the Reformation: "the temptation to loot Church property and the habit of doing so had appeared and was growing; and this rapidly created a vested interest in promoting the change in religion. Those who attacked Catholic doctrine, as for instance, in the matters of celibacy in the monastic Orders, or of a divinely appointed Hierarchy with the Papacy at its summit, opened the door for the seizure of the enormous clerical endowments, monastic, episcopal and parochial, by the Princes of City corporations. Men already individually powerful through their wealth, especially through their ownership of land, joined the rapine. The property of convents and monasteries passed wholesale to the looters over great areas of Christendom: Scandinavia, The British Isles, the Northern Netherlands, much of the Germanies and many of the Swiss Cantons. The endowments of hospitals, colleges, schools, guilds, were largely though not wholly seized. Those of the clergy and hierarchy, the lands supporting Bishoprics and Chapters and parish clergy were robbed from seven-eights to half of their value. -- Hilaire Belloc, Characters of the Reformation

[Salvation]

Hopefully Bishops will choose to go to jail in support of NOT killing the unborn!

As I said above, “The age of martyrs is coming to the United States.”

You didn’t put in that choice — believing in God’s choice since God is pro-life.

[sitetest]

Dear DBeers,

“What will the administration do if the Bishops do not comply with the seizures?”

What do you mean “...if the Bishops do not comply with the seizures?”?

Do you have any idea how this works?

If the Church doesn't receive relief - either judicial or legislative, and legislative doesn't look like that's going to happen - then the government will have a right to impose whatever penalties or fines are written into law. The best case would be if the government must actually sue various Catholic organizations and institutions to collect whatever fines, fees and penalties for which they ask. Less good would be an administrative hearing to impose these charges. Worst would be if the law is written to permit the IRS to just automatically impose a lien on bank accounts, etc., and then just execute a funds transfer.

But no matter what, the end result is the same (barring a court intervening) - the government will execute a seizure of funds from the institution's bank accounts, and that will be that!

Of course, that will get messy when the government seizes funds that were meant to: pay vendors; pay employees; pay contractors; pay the utilities, etc.

Then, if the deficit is sufficient, and there is not enough money forthcoming from other sources to cover it, the institution will be forced to close.

The primary purpose of the regime is not, at this time, to throw bishops in jail and arouse the populace against the regime. Rather, the regime is acting to destroy mediating civil institutions like Catholic schools, hospitals and other Catholic charitable entities. With Obamacare and the HHS mandate, if the bishops don't win in court and refuse to comply, the regime will be able to fulfill its current, intermediate goal of the destruction of Catholic civil organizations. But the bishops won't go to jail. It's tough to fight the execution of a federal government-imposed funds seizure.

Now, obviously, various Church entities have sued the regime in court over the HHS mandate, and they could actually win their cases. At least some of them. In which case, the Church will get a reprieve, and the bishops STILL won't go to jail, LOL.

sitetest

[Rashputin]

A second Civil War has been simmering along to a conclusion for the past thirty years but didn't have the right sort of emotional trigger. Abortion and euthanasia mandated by the State is the sort of trigger that could finally light the fuse. Especially when the economy is already crap and people don't have faith in their future getting better which is usually a major brake on people taking big risks.

[tioga]

We have given up freedoms right and left for years. Our crotches are groped, our land taken...guns are next. The true faithful will revolt. This has happened in many countries and ours is looking less and less like the land of the free. The so called “separation of church and state” goes both ways. While we cede ground to the socialists/commies in DC, we will not cede our religious freedom. This could be the 1960s antiwar movement for our youth. Don’t underestimate the hammer coming down on religious freedom. There is a line and thewon might just have found it.

[tioga]

I do recall thewon focusing on those Pennsylvanians clinging to their guns and religion. He was honing in on those two things back in ‘08. Is it just a coincidence? I doubt it, he’s coming for us.

[steve86]

When is the last time the Catholic Church excommunicated someone?

Probably a few seconds or, at the most, a few minutes ago. It is called latæ sententiæ.