California Forces Catholic Universities to Pay for Abortions for Their Employees

Life News ^ | August 22, 2014 | Steven Ertelt

[NYer]

I told you this was coming. Now, Jerry Brown has decided to force two Catholic universities to cover abortion in their health insurance.

From the San Francisco Chronicle story:

Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration has reversed an earlier decision to allow two Catholic universities to eliminate coverage of most abortions for employees, saying state law requires health insurance plans to cover all abortions…

Urged by abortion-rights groups and university employees to reconsider the issue, Brown’s Department of Managed Health Care, in letters to be sent Friday to insurers for both universities, said the exclusions violate a 1975 state law that requires group health plans to cover all basic services – defined, by the law, as those that are “medically necessary.”

“Abortion is a basic health care service,” the department’s director, Michelle Rouillard, said in the letter.

Religious freedom means nothing to those who wish to use health care to impose their secularist world view on everyone.

One more point: Over at First Things, I have a piece about how “pro-choice” is fast becoming “pro-abortion.” Here is the conclusion, which I ask you to ponder in connection with the California authoritarianism:

I expect that in the coming years abortion rights supporters will execute a tactical retreat that admits the humanity of the unborn, conjoined with a strong counter-offensive dismissing the moral relevance of that biological fact. What matters, advocates will increasingly assert, is the state’s guarantee that women’s reproductive desires are fulfilled—with abortion viewed as a positively good way of doing so.

Can I call them, or can I call them?

What starts in California doesn’t stay in California. Forced abortion coverage will be the next front in the war against religious freedom.

[NYer]

LifeNews.com Note: Wesley J. Smith, J.D., is a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture and a bioethics attorney who blogs at Human Exeptionalism.

[NYer]

Catholic Ping!

[Graewoulf]

PING!

[Rich21IE]

No surprise here. Paganism is ascendant in these times. At least until such time as the Socialist Pagans run up against the Fundamentalist Muslims. Then of course the cowards will either cut an exception for their anti-Christin Muslim friends or suffer interesting consequences.

[Gen.Blather]

Why not stop offering health insurance?

[Dick Vomer]

let’s see if the Catholics will stick to their faith or chose to be inspired by the secular forces lined up against it.

[steve86]

Why not stop offering health insurance?

Obviously they would lose their best employees. That's not the answer.

[afraidfortherepublic]

Would it hurt this author to discose the NAMES of the 2 Universities? I’ve been to the original link, and there is no more info there thatn in this excerpt.

California has more than 2 Catholic Universities, and I’d wager that this rule applies to all of them.

Off the top of my head, I remember Santa Clara, University of San Francisco. Moraga (it has a different name, but I’ve forgotten it). Loyola. And there is a relatively new, very conservative one in Southern California.

[Verginius Rufus]

Jerry Brown is an ex-seminarian who attended a Jesuit seminary. It’s not clear from the posting whether he was personally involved in this decision.

[Hieronymus]

Brown is a former Jesuit seminarian, so we know where at least one Catholic stands.

[Verginius Rufus]

The University of San Diego is a Catholic university.

There is St. Mary's College of Moraga and Loyola Marymount University in LA.

[afraidfortherepublic]

Holy Names University
Oakland, California

John Paul the Great Catholic University
San Diego, California

Loyola Marymount University
Los Angeles, California

Marymount College
Rancho Palos Verdes, California

Mount St. Mary’s College
Los Angeles, California

Notre Dame de Namur University
Belmont, California

Saint Marys College of California
Moraga, California

Santa Clara University
Santa Clara, California

Thomas Aquinas College
Santa Paula, California

University of San Diego
San Diego, California

University of San Francisco
San Francisco, California

[freedumb2003]

I gather hey will drop health care completely and take the obozofine.

[Verginius Rufus]

Thomas Aquinas College dates back to the 1970s. It was in Calabasas but I think it is now in Santa Paula.

I vaguely remember talk of starting another Catholic university in the San Diego area but don't know if it is operating already. Named in honor of Pope John Paul II?

[Graybeard58]

They might be able to avoid the rule if they reject all gov funds.

(Like that’s gonna happen)

[SevenofNine]

Last time I hear Jerry Brown is Buddist

[Gene Eric]

>> let’s see if the Catholics will stick to their faith

No sense giving the impression you’re just a bystander to this tyranny.

[forgotten man]

The two universities, Santa Clara and Loyola Marymount, are both Jesuit institutions. I am not sure if they are Catholic universities.

[Thank You Rush]

Catholic????

Santa Clara University
Santa Clara, California

University of San Diego
San Diego, California

University of San Francisco
San Francisco, California

[tanknetter]

I’m having a hard time getting worked up over this.

Things have been pointing in this direction for 20+ years now. And the Roman Catholic Church has said the right words on this specific matter, but otherwise enabled the consolidation of power by Liberals/Progressives/Democrats that has now brought us to this point.