Yesterday, the bishops launched the Fortnight for Freedom against the mandate from the Obama administration that would force Catholics to act against their conscience by providing coverage of contraceptives, abortifacients, and sterilization procedures.
While the media is stacked against us and seeks to put the Church in a bad light, I’m pretty sure this headline from UPI on the Fortnight isn’t bias, it’s just pure stupidity.
Here it is:
Catholic Bishops Launch Contraception Push.
Ha!
June 22, 2012 at 3:48 pm
It is biased. The media is framing it again in contraception terms. It should simply say something like "Catholic Bishops Launch Fortnight for Freedom": yes, name it for what it really is (imagine that).
I was in the 6th pew from the front at the mass. Here's my little view of it.
June 22, 2012 at 5:23 pm
When these people find themselves in hell for practicing lust, they most certainly will blame the bishops for giving them contraceptives and abortificients.
June 22, 2012 at 5:58 pm
I don't get the whole "it's not about contraception" mantra. It most certainly is about that. It's use is a sin that goes contrary to the natural law (and therefore it is wrong for the government subsidize that sin or force anyone to participate in that sin, Catholic or not). I understand why we are framing it as a religious freedom issue: most people have lost their reason when it comes to contraception and therefore see it as a preculiar Catholic thing. But the violation of religious freedom that we are claiming is that our Catholic institutions would be forced to essentialyl supply contraceptive devices and procedures.
Trying to obfuscate the fact that this is about contraception seems to me as a way to gain support from people who think contraception is just fine. It seem like irenicism.
Admitting that it is about contraception seems to me to be a good way to witness to the immutable natural law or to the fact that the Church has a sacred freedom and charism by virtue of the duties it alone has received from God.
Instead it seems we have chosen to witness just to the positivist man-made law of the U.S. Constitution–or at best to a doctrine that Pope Benedict described as "not so permanent" compared to actual principles (like the fact tha contraception is contrary to the natural law) and a mere "social and historical necessity" (Christmas Address to the Roman Curia Dec. 22, 2012).
June 22, 2012 at 6:00 pm
oops, that date in my citation should have been 2005, not 2012.
June 22, 2012 at 8:51 pm
I don't get the whole "it's not about contraception" mantra.
Because it's not about contraception. To put it more succinctly, the issue is not the use of contraception, but rather the freedom of religious institutions to not pay for contraceptive services. So while you are correct that in a certain sense this is about contraception, the greater issue is religious freedom and the ability of religious institutions to be free from coercion to subsidize practices that are contrary to their beliefs.
Trying to obfuscate the fact that this is about contraception seems to me as a way to gain support from people who think contraception is just fine.
It's not obfuscation because, again, the issue is not the use and distribution of contraception.
June 22, 2012 at 9:30 pm
I think I understand what you're saying. It just seems to me the real reason we're protesting this law is because contraception is an objectively moral evil that we are being coerced into paying for. There's a reason the Church didn't protest the Supreme Court decision that said peyote use, even for religious purposes, could be outlawed (we're fine with that because getting intoxicated to that level is contrary to the natural law) or, for similar reasons, the Church didn't protest the state coercing Fundamentalist Mormons, etc.
My point is, what the government is doing is not wrong because the U.S. Constitution says (according to one intepretation…) the state cannot interfere with religious institutions (we are fine with them doing so in other situations), but because contraception is an objective moral evil. The Constitutional argument is just the best way to proceed under the law of the land.
Contraception as a moral evil is at the very heart of this controversy; the 1st Amendment claims are accessory to that fact.
Doc
June 23, 2012 at 10:26 pm
The problem is that the Mandate limits the religious exemption to faith organizations dealing only with their own members. So a Catholic hospital or a school who attend to all faiths could not be included in the religious exemption. Catholic institutions are being singled out. More than likely because employ and serve many people. Also the Catholic faith is holing up liberal socialist agenda in the areas of gay rights, abortion, contraception and support of traditional marriage. The headline is it is about contraception, but really it is about the tearing down one of the last vestiges of civil society.