Important: US Bishops taking the gloves off on health care reform

AmericanPapist.com ^ | Thursday, October 08, 2009 | Thomas Peters

[Salvation]

Thursday, October 08, 2009

Important: US Bishops taking the gloves off on health care reform

I'm literally about to step into a car and drive to Ft. Collins, CO tonight, where I will be presenting a speech to young adults on "Catholic Principles of Health Care Reform" (encore performance tomorrow night in Denver, details have been posted), but wanted beforehand to update AmP readers on an important development.

This from religion and politics reporters Dan Gilgoff:

After alleging that the House healthcare bill includes an abortion mandate and taxpayer-funded abortion, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have kept quiet as the Senate Finance Committee has wrestled with its version of healthcare reform these last couple of weeks. But in a letter to House leaders today, the bishops make clear that they're opposed to both bills as they currently stand—and skeptical that their grievances will be addressed.

Abortion continues to be the top concern. Here's an excerpt [of the bishops' letter]:

    We continue to urge you to:

    1. Exclude mandated coverage for abortion, and incorporate longstanding policies against abortion funding and in favor of conscience rights. No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion. It is essential that the legislation clearly apply to this new program longstanding and widely supported federal restrictions on abortion funding and mandates, and protections for rights of conscience. No current bill meets this test....

    We sincerely hope that the legislation will not fall short of our criteria. However, we remain apprehensive when amendments protecting freedom of conscience and ensuring no taxpayer money for abortion are defeated in committee votes. If acceptable language in these areas cannot be found, we will have to oppose the health care bill vigorously.

Read full letter here.

John Jalsevac at LifeSiteNews has a summary, as does George Stephanapoulos from a political perspective.

As I said in my post title - this has the feeling of "taking the gloves off". Finally. Good.

[Salvation]

God bless these bishops!

[Salvation]

More and more bishops speaking out against Obamacare!!

Important: US Bishops taking the gloves off on health care reform
BREAKING: Catholic Bishops On Health Care - Change Bills Or Else
U.S. bishops warn of vigorous opposition if Congress fails to fix health care bills
List: *41* Bishops against Obamacare (and counting!)
Bishop Murphy Issues Video Statement on Health Care Reform [Diocese of Rockville Centre]

Health Care Principles [Bishop Samuel Aquila, Fargo, ND]
Florida Bishop [Thomas Wenski] Weighs in on Health Care Reform
ObamaCare and Catholic social teaching [Bishop Neckless]
Some Catholic bishops question gov't health care
Boston’s Roman Catholic Cardinal Says He Confronted Obama about Abortion in Health Care Plan....

Iowa Bishop: Don’t Be Railroaded into the Current...Health Care Proposals
in a message issued by the Diocese of Sioux City (The Church on Universal Healthcare)
Nazi Health Care A Catholic Bishop Speaks Out Against "End of Life Care" (Germany, 1941)
Bishop Nickless: "No Health Care Reform is Better than the Wrong Health Care Reform"
Cardinal Rigali, Abp. Chaput Intensify Warnings Against Obamacare's Abortion Expansion

[boatbums]

Yes, indeed, FINALLY! Hope they mean it and stick to their guns.

[FormerACLUmember]

Mandating Catholic hospitals and doctors into killing babies is not popular among the bishops.

[Salvation]

No way would the Bishops ever stand for anything like that.

[Religion Moderator]

Do not use potty language - or references to potty language - on the Religion Forum.

[Salvation]

If you read the article above it talked about legal immigrants. That is what I was referring to.

For your information, the Bishops are not being communistic. A Communist would never support a pro-life idea. They wouldn’t even care.

[Melian]

Thank goodness! I was getting worried. Every Sunday our petitions are so “kumbaya” I was concerned the Church was endorsing this fiasco. They seem torn because they want health care for the poor and downtrodden, but they know their are abortion strings attached to this particular health care overhaul.

[Salvation]

Yes, Mel, I think we can be extremely thankful.

Our Bishops would never let anything that was anti-life and pro-death get their approval.

[Salvation]

BTW, our intentions/petitions ALWAUS have a pro-life intention in them. Are we blessed at our church, or what?

[xsmommy]

well they better get the word out to the ‘squishy’ parishes because i have been hearing the kumbaya crap about healthcare in the petitions and sermons at those type of churches. my husband nearly exploded on prolife sunday when the priest spoke of the need for healthcare reform and did not MENTION the coverage for abortion.

[xsmommy]

That’s the indicia of a “good” parish, IMO. we have it at our’s as well, but sometimes we go to neighboring parishes when our schedules dictate based on mass offering times, and instead of a prolife intention they have a pro-healthcare reform one. My husband can never contain himself in those situations. On prolife sunday, my daughter and i went to our parish and heard a fantastic prolife sermon. my husband and son went to a neighboring squishy parish and got the we need healthcare reform sermon. immediately after the sermon, according to my teenaged son, my husband said aloud “well, THAT was a scandal” and the woman in front of him turned around and said i agree.

[incredulous joe]

I am always, always, always supportive of our pro-life Cardinals and Bishops, but exactly what were they waiting for?

Glad they have stepped up, but they obviously DO NOT understand the “game of inches” that is politics, the need to get out in front and the fact that you can never give the members of the death cult pasrty the benefit of the doubt.

They need to snuff this bill, totally, so that we are not stuck with the trojan horse that is constructed by NARAL and the Democratic Party.

No part of it will be good.

[militant2]

“I am always, always, always supportive of our pro-life Cardinals and Bishops, but exactly what were they waiting for?”

Exactly.....what have they been waiting for?? You can’t tell me that these guys didn’t know Obama’s record on pro-death legislation prior to the election. Why weren’t they screaming from the pulpit as 53% of their flock were preparing to elect the baby murderer? On top of that, in the 9 plus months that this monster has been in office, there has still been nothing but a bunch of gum flapping from our so called Church leaders!!

This is a black and white issue, folks! Murder is murder! Inaction is complicity, and the Church’s leaders have chosen inaction. Talk is cheap. From the Holy Father on down, there needs to be the go-ahead for the excommunication of all politicians, public figures and everyone who, through supporting this evil president and congress, supports the ongoing murder of millions of babies!

The pathetic love fest on this forum makes me want to throw up!

Militant

[Salvation]

**but exactly what were they waiting for?**

Good question. When you get the answer, please let me know!

[Melian]

I know. It’s really hard to sit there and listen to it. This lack of clarity on the part of our homilists is why so many Catholics thought it was okay to vote for Obysmal.

I don’t give large donations to the Church anymore; I give to the organizations within the Church that are doing things correctly. I like St. Vincent de Paul’s work and we sponsor a parish in Africa. I’d rather contribute to fostering the traditional Catholic faith of converts in Africa than my very “green and squishy” parish. I also like to give something to the Dominican sisters retirement fund, since they were the ones who educated me.

[Sun]

Some might want to comment on George’s blog about the bishop’s story:

http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/2009/10/breaking-catholic-bishops-on-health-care-change-bills-or-else.html

[from occupied ga]

For your information, the Bishops are not being communistic

Sorry for the slow response, I've been out of town. Obviously you don't understand the definition of communism. For your continuing education here are deinitions from dictionary.com

1. a theory or system of social organization based on the holding of all property in common, actual ownership being ascribed to the community as a whole or to the state.

2. (often initial capital letter) a system of social organization in which all economic and social activity is controlled by a totalitarian state dominated by a single and self-perpetuating political party.

I see nothing about abortion one way or the other. In fact some religious orders (according to the rule of st benedict) such as the trappists and cistercians practice communism, but they hardly approve of abortion.

So-called "social justice" is nothing but wealth redistribution from those who worked for it to some other category of folks via some arbitrary rules.

[pray4liberty]

They seem torn because they want health care for the poor and downtrodden...

Then the Catholic Church ought to use some of their own vast resources to buy medical insurance for the poor. We need to take care of our own and leave this commie government out of it as much as we can.