If you thought the Catholic Church and universities affiliated with it would quietly accept the Obama administration’s “compromise” for the contraception mandate, well, think again. From Fox News:
Some of the most influential Catholic institutions in the country filed suit in federal district court Monday against the so-called contraception mandate, in one of the biggest coordinated legal challenges to the rule to date.
Claiming their “fundamental rights hang in the balance,” a total of 43 plaintiffs filed a dozen separate lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the requirement. Among the organizations filing were the University of Notre Dame, the Archdiocese of New York and The Catholic University of America.
The groups are objecting to the requirement from the federal health care overhaul that employers provide access to contraceptive care. The Obama administration several months back softened its position on the mandate, but some religious organizations complained the administration did not go far enough to ensure the rule would not compel them to violate their religious beliefs.
That “softened” position by the administration is nothing but an accounting fiction in which Catholic employers are supposed to pretend that insurance companies will pay for the procedures to which they object from some kind of mystery revenues beyond the employers’ contributions. These are not a bunch of ultra-conservative organizations: Notre Dame had President Obama as its commencement speaker three years ago.
The lawsuits ensure that the church will continue to hammer away at this issue throughout the election season. It is big-time self-inflicted wound for the Obama team.
– By Kyle Wingfield
217 comments Add your comment
redneckbluedog
May 21st, 2012
5:25 pm
Obama looked VERY impressive at his NATO press conference today. Very cogent about every subject. I see no reason to make a change, especially in these risky times….
Joe the Prophet
May 21st, 2012
5:27 pm
BREAKING NEWS….Mormon groups are suing the US government to reinstate polygamy…..!!!!!
If the homosexuals can do it, then so can the polygamists….!!!!
iggy
May 21st, 2012
5:31 pm
“Obama looked VERY impressive at his NATO press conference today. Very cogent about every subject. I see no reason to make a change, especially in these risky times….”
LOL…ummm k Kyle!
Rafe Hollister
May 21st, 2012
5:46 pm
Glad to see that the Catholic Bishops are not as easily intimidated as Cory Booker. I’m glad that they filed this suit, and maybe this will convince their followers that maybe they should examine why the majority of them continue to support Barry Oblamer, in spite of his war on religion.
MarkV
May 21st, 2012
6:00 pm
td @4:47 pm: “The 1st Amendment is clear and the SCOTUS will say this law is unconstitutional.”
td,
So now you are not only a constitutional expert but also a seer who knows how SCOTUS will decide. The interesting part is that you have not attempted to answer the question: How does giving the women the Church employs the same rights as women anywhere else prohibit the Church to exercise their religion?
Tiberius - Banned by Bookman and proud of it!
May 21st, 2012
6:11 pm
MarkV, you need to learn the difference between “rights” and “benefits”.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
6:51 pm
@Rafe Hollister
May 21st, 2012
5:46 pm
Glad to see that the Catholic Bishops are not as easily intimidated as Cory Booker. I’m glad that they filed this suit, and maybe this will convince their followers that maybe they should examine why the majority of them continue to support Barry Oblamer, in spite of his war on religion.
******************************************************************************************
Are you glad to see that the Catholic Bishops are not easily INTIMIDATED THAT THEY
MIGHT GO TO JAIL FOR MOLESTING CHILDREN?
That’s WHAT they should be INTMIDATED BY.
They talk about CORPORATE CONSCIENCE.
WHAT ABOUT MORAL CONSCIENCE?
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
6:58 pm
@iggy
May 21st, 2012
5:31 pm
“Obama looked VERY impressive at his NATO press conference today. Very cogent about every subject. I see no reason to make a change, especially in these risky times….”
LOL…ummm k Kyle!
**********************************************************************
WHY are YOU people so JEALOUS of President Obama?
Is it his SMILE?
Is it his SWAGGER?
Is it his POPULARITY?
Is it his KNOWLEGE?
Is it his INTELLIGENCE?
Is it his CHARM?
Is it his LACK OF SCANDALOUS BAGGAGE?
Is it his RACE?
WHAT IS IT?
I KNOW……HE IS IMPRESSIVE.
heeheeheeheeheeheeheeheehee
Tiberius - Banned by Bookman and proud of it!
May 21st, 2012
7:03 pm
Anybody can look impressive when the fawning myrmidons of the media won’t challenge you.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
7:05 pm
“The lawsuits ensure that the church will continue to hammer away at this issue throughout the election season. It is big-time self-inflicted wound for the Obama team. ”
**********************************************************
The lawsuits will ENSURE that people WILL NOT FORGET what the HYPOCRITICAL
PRIESTS and BISHOPS have done to INNOCENT CHILDREN.
CONS have a SHORT MEMORY.
LIBERALS never FORGET.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
7:10 pm
@Tiberius – Banned by Bookman and proud of it!
May 21st, 2012
7:03 pm
Anybody can look impressive when the fawning myrmidons of the media won’t challenge you.
*********************************************************************
SO FOX News IS NOT THE MEDIA?
mmmmmmmmmmmmm.
jconservative
May 21st, 2012
7:14 pm
“Are children PROTECTED BY the First Amendment’s protection of religious liberties?”
No.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
7:15 pm
“The lawsuits ensure that the church will continue to hammer away at this issue throughout the election season. It is big-time self-inflicted wound for the Obama team. ”
**********************************************************
SO Cons are SUPPORTING THE Catholic Bishops?
Did Cons SUPPORT the children that WERE MOLESTED BY THEM?
CONS have a SHORT MEMORY.
LIBERALS never FORGET.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
7:25 pm
@jconservative
May 21st, 2012
7:14 pm
“Are children PROTECTED BY the First Amendment’s protection of religious liberties?”
No.
**********************************************************************
No they are not PROTECTED BY the First Amendment’s protection of religious liberties.
HOWEVER; they SHOULD BE PROTECTED BY ALL AMERICANS.
Including CONS, PRIESTS AND BISHOPS.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
7:27 pm
Moochers think freebies ARE their rights.
Losers.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
7:30 pm
So Obozo looks impressive, eh? How does Obozo’s DEFICIT look?
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
7:35 pm
@Lil’ Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
7:27 pm
Moochers think freebies ARE their rights.
Losers.
************************************************************
FREE AIN’T FREE
“There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.”
Duh!!!!!
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
7:43 pm
@Lil’ Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
7:30 pm
So Obozo looks impressive, eh? How does Obozo’s DEFICIT look?
****************************************************************************
HOW DOES BUSH’S DEFICIT LOOK?
The U.S. national debt grew significantly from 2001 to 2008, both in dollars terms and relative to the size of the economy (GDP), due to a combination of tax cuts and wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
During the George W. Bush administration, the federal government spending was increased from $1789 billion to $2983 billion (70%) but the revenues were only increased from $2025 billion to $2524 billion (from 2000 to 2008). Individual income tax revenues were increased by 14%, corporate tax revenues by 50%, customs and duties by 40%. Discretionary defense spending was increased by 107%, discretionary domestic spending by 62%, Medicare spending by 131%, social security by 51%, and income security spending by 130%. Cyclically adjusted, revenues rose by 35% and spending by 65%.
Also proportionally Bush increased government spending more than any predecessor since LBJ (including).
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aint that something
May 21st, 2012
7:48 pm
Did the Catholic Church or the Catholic based org that provides insurance to Georgetown University staff stop funding contraceptives?
Save your rant about the girl who testified before Congress. That was a sham on all sides.
With that said, if it is enough to sue then I would assume that anywhere that it isn’t already mandated the Catholic Church and any of its affiliates must have stopped providing coverage for contraceptives.
Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:07 pm
How does giving the women the Church employs the same rights as women anywhere else prohibit the Church to exercise their religion?
First, the presumption on the part of liberals or Marxists is that healthcare is a RIGHT, as in an “unalienable right” (which it ain’t), and particularity with respect to a woman’s reproductive healthcare(which is less of an individual right, with its’ gender based bias).
Second, churches regardless of which one or even any private employer is not obligated constitutionally to provide healthcare to anyone let alone a gender specific one that serves reproductive health (even should ObumerCare survive Constitutional challenge, which it won’t).
Third, religious freedom IS A PROTECTED RIGHT under the Constitution from government powers given specifically to churches and established religion, which private employers anywhere else have never enjoyed.
obumer is going to lose on this one as rightly he and these Marxist “so-called Progressives” should, for once again failing to amend the Constitution to make fit room for a healthcare law rather than as they have since Woodrow Wilson ignoring the constitution and passing laws outside the confines of our nation’s “legal canon”.
PS. With regards particularly to the Catholic Church, as they have long opposed any form of birth control on the bases of their Theological views: While I do not agree with their view on this particular issue of “all contraception” use, I will defend and protest with them for their rights to exercise it as if it were my own religious belief, by reason that if any religion suffers a denial of religious liberty, then all faiths, churches, religious establishment are endanger of persecution if not the very threat of an extinction.
td
May 21st, 2012
8:11 pm
MarkV
May 21st, 2012
6:00 pm
“How does giving the women the Church employs the same rights as women anywhere else prohibit the Church to exercise their religion?”
Since when has giving a person contraceptives for free become a right? Since when has a benefit become a right? Is is not true that an employer does not even have to offer insurance at all to its employers? Also, how can the Federal government force an employer like Notre Dame, who self insures, to offer contraception coverage?
Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:19 pm
Well, td, bad as I hate to quote Boe Jiden…
They don’t get us!
They will never learn what the amendment process is all about and why it is necessary to first amend the Constitution to allow for expansions, even if they are SOCIALIST, as long as they can get’em ratified, so be it. That is the legal legitimate process used to expand what are deemed fundamental rights to conditional privileges, like healthcare.
Out by the Pond
May 21st, 2012
8:19 pm
Catholic Charities provides contraception coverage as mandated by GA Law. So what is the problem? Oh a democrat is in the white house.
Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:29 pm
So what is the problem?
Try getting your socialist democrat comrades to amend the U.S. Constitution to fit your unconstitutional healthcare law for starters.
BTW, health departments and other organizations provide contraception at reduced cost or free contraceptives in many cases so why do you socialist have this problem of insisting on forcing religious organization to bend their moral convictions over backwards to satisfy your petty peeves?
MarkV
May 21st, 2012
8:30 pm
td @8:11 pm
First, you should think twice before adopting the comment of a mental midget regarding the difference between “right’ and a “benefit.” What we deal with here is a labor law, which gives the women a right to a benefit. Thus the issue in not about whether benefit becomes a right, or a falsity about “giving a person contraceptives for free.” You could claim the same for anything that medical insurance pays for.
The main issue is whether a church, any church, can proclaim anything in a law to be inapplicable to its employees, regardless of their religious affiliation, on the basis of a religious dogma. This would lead to a religious dictatorship.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
8:32 pm
MHS, forcing religious organizations to provide contraception is a two-fer…it allows Democrat politicians to buy the votes of their parasite base, and it sticks it to one of their mortal enemies–people of faith.
Communists fear organized religion and have a long history of trying to eliminate it.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
8:36 pm
The main issue is whether a church, any church, can proclaim anything in a law to be inapplicable to its employees
————————–
Wrong. The main issue is whether a government, any government, can force a religious organization to violate their beliefs.
Note to libtards: The separation of church and state that you (situationally) cling to works both ways.
iggy
May 21st, 2012
8:37 pm
Swagger? I really not sure what “swaggalin, swaggin, swaggleRock” is or is supposed to be.
Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:38 pm
Labor laws do not trump the U. S. Constitution.
The main issue is whether a church, any church, can proclaim anything in a law to be inapplicable to its employees, regardless of their religious affiliation, on the basis of a religious dogma. This would lead to a religious dictatorship.
Totally false claim. Other places of employment and other organizations public and private provide contraception and they are not subject to any religions authority. Churches do enjoy exemptions on moral grounds as a matter of religious freedom particularly where this freedom does not preclude any individual the liberty to go elsewhere to worship or obtain desirable employment.
Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:42 pm
And there is a major difference between a Right, a Benefit or a Privilege. Only the mentally cripple don’t know this fact.
Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:45 pm
Communists fear organized religion and have a long history of trying to eliminate it.
Yeah that does sound familiar…
Marx: Religion is the opiate of the people.
Tiberius - Banned by Bookman and proud of it!
May 21st, 2012
9:04 pm
MarkV gets chippy when his cherished fantasies are exposed for the frauds they are.
td
May 21st, 2012
9:06 pm
MarkV
May 21st, 2012
8:30 pm
Let us forget for a moment that you seem to forget about the 1st amendment and it is way more important then labor law. and ask the following question. Let us take a company like Lockheed, can they deny contraceptive coverage? Can they fire a person or charge them more for insurance if they smoke or are overweight?
Tiberius - Banned by Bookman and proud of it!
May 21st, 2012
9:06 pm
MarkV also needs to bone up on his understanding of the term “dictatorship “.
@@
May 21st, 2012
9:10 pm
I thought the CC was gonna drop healthcare coverage altogether. It would have been interesting to see their employees reaction.
I guess this is where “the rubber” meets the road?
Mary Grabar
May 21st, 2012
9:14 pm
Faustian pact. Why did so many Catholics vote for Obama in the first place?
Tiberius - Banned by Bookman and proud of it!
May 21st, 2012
9:24 pm
Certain Catholic universities had announced they were dropping coverage,@@.
I Report (-: You Whine )-: mmm, mmmm, mmmmm! Just sayin...
May 21st, 2012
9:29 pm
The Obama campaign’s attacks on Bain haven’t gone very well, in part because the claims are so transparently cynical. Everyone knows they’re cherry-picking facts, focusing on the rare Bain Capital failures while ignoring the successes—all in order to distract attention from the failed results of Mr. Obama’s economic policies.
obozo is the best campaign manager that Romney could ask for.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
9:54 pm
@Michael H. Smith
May 21st, 2012
8:07 pm
PS. With regards particularly to the Catholic Church, as they have long opposed any form of birth control on the bases of their Theological views: While I do not agree with their view on this particular issue of “all contraception” use, I will defend and protest with them for their rights to exercise it as if it were my own religious belief, by reason that if any religion suffers a denial of religious liberty, then all faiths, churches, religious establishment are endanger of persecution if not the very threat of an extinction.
**************************************************************
“According to a study by the Guttmacher Institute, most women, including 98 percent of Catholic women, have used contraception.”
98%
98%
98%
98%
98%
CATHOLICS ARE HYPOCRITES.
On one hand they oppose the use of contraception.
On the other hand THEY TURN A BLIND EYE TO CHILD MOLESTATION BY
THEIR OWN PRIESTS AND BISHOPS.
WHICH IS MORE IMPORTANT?
CONTRACEPTION OR CHILD MOLESTATION?
MarkV
May 21st, 2012
9:55 pm
td @ 9:06 pm: “ Let us forget for a moment that you seem to forget about the 1st amendment and it is way more important then labor law…”
Let’s NOT forget. You still have not answered the question how providing a benefit, any benefit required by the law, prohibits an exercise of religion.
And let’s go to the crux of the issue. You claim that a religious organization can deny a benefit on moral grounds based on a religious dogma. Therefore, if a religious dogma considered women’s work fundamentally inferior to men’s, they could deny women the protection of the Equal Pay Act?
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
10:03 pm
@Lil’ Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
8:32 pm
MHS, forcing religious organizations to provide contraception is a two-fer…it allows Democrat politicians to buy the votes of their parasite base, and it sticks it to one of their mortal enemies–people of faith.
Communists fear organized religion and have a long history of trying to eliminate it.
**************************************************************************
mmmmmmmm
The views of socialism and communism differ in the distribution of wealth produced by the economy.
Socialism supports the view that the goods and services produced should be dispensed based on the productivity of an individual.
In contrast, communism believes that the wealth should be shared by the masses based on the needs of the individual.
td
May 21st, 2012
10:11 pm
MarkV
May 21st, 2012
9:55 pm
I thought I answered your question but I will do it again. The government does not have the right to dictate a moral or value to a religious institution. Contraception is against the tenets of the Catholic Church (not my church) and hence for the Federal government to tell them they have to cover BC is against the 1st amendment protections.
You are giving a hypothetical that has no basis in fact that I am aware of but to answer your question then I would say that if it was a well defined then I would say that the government could not dictate to them about pay. I would think that in that circumstance women would not want to work for the church. It would be also true if the said church said men were worth less pay, so this is not about just women.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
10:17 pm
@Lil’ Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
May 21st, 2012
8:36 pm
The main issue is whether a church, any church, can proclaim anything in a law to be inapplicable to its employees
————————–
Wrong. The main issue is whether a government, any government, can force a religious organization to violate their beliefs.
Note to libtards: The separation of church and state that you (situationally) cling to works both ways.
****************************************************************************************
NOTE TO CONS:
The main issue is whether a government, can force a religious organization
like the CATHOLIC CHURCH TO STOP MOLESTING CHILDREN.
‘The problem is not just with the fraction of priests who molests youngsters, but in
an ecclesiastical power structure which harbours pedophiles, conceals other
sexual behaviour patterns among its clerics and uses the strategies of duplicity
and counterattack against the victims.’
The evidence is that a higher percentage of Catholic priests and male Religious molest
children more than other ministers of religion.
The minor victims of priest abuse are overwhelmingly boys and teenagers, (80­90%), which is
contrary to the pattern of abuse in the general population.
American studies are not the only ones which defy the assumption that clergy of
all denominations abuse equally. . It found that 93% of convicted and imprisoned
child molesters had themselves been sexually abused as children and 60%
stated that they had been abused by a Catholic priest or Brother.
The Conspiracy
There has been a nationwide pattern over the last 35 years.
Bishops know of ongoing sexual misconduct by Catholic priests and
religious and bishops co-operate to keep such misconduct from becoming public
knowledge.
The following are uniform practices:
failing to investigate indications of any sexual misconduct, even with children;
failing to supervise properly the cleric in his assignment,
failing to ensure that the cleric is prosecuted for misconduct with children.
Once an incident occurs, energy and policies at the highest levels of Church authority
have been directed to damage control, avoidance of scandal at all costs,
and efforts to placate and manipulate victims and families.
The latter often involves intimidation, misleading information, and
even fraudulent means, if necessary. Policy also involves maintaining the priest in
a new assignment without proper supervision and without informing the
congregation where the abusive behaviour usually continues.
lloydrmc
May 21st, 2012
10:20 pm
@ByteMe “It’s another self-inflicted wound for the man-dominant out-of-touch Catholic hierarchy.” That would be “…male dominated…” If you want to sound like a feminist, at least get your syntax straight
@thebob.bob “To prevent medication for those other conditions is unconscionable.” Well, that’s good, because they don’t. Or at least Georgetown U. – home of Sandra Fluke – doesn’t. Try checking your facts before parroting DNC talking points.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
10:23 pm
@iggy
May 21st, 2012
8:37 pm
Swagger? I really not sure what “swaggalin, swaggin, swaggleRock” is or is supposed to be.
**********************************************************************
IF YOU ARE NOT SURE WHAT IT IS OR SUPPOSE TO BE…………
THEN YOU DON’T HAVE IT.
Swagger –
A very confident gait or manner.
Walk or behave in a very confident way.
Pizzaman
May 21st, 2012
10:30 pm
In the Bible Jesus says “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar and to God the things that are God’s” It seams that the Church that taught me that 60 years ago has forgotten it and I’m ashamed to be Catholic!
lloydrmc
May 21st, 2012
10:33 pm
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests? :”The Day of reckoning IS FAST APPROACHING (November 2012) for the GOP….Its PAYBACK TIME”
Yeah, sure. Just like 2010, except the Democrat Party is going to get paid back even worse than they were, then. Politically, it was a complete bloodbath, all the way up and down the ticket, including the loss of the U.S. House of representatives and 700+ seats in state legislatures.
For instance, did you know that Scott Walker got more votes in the Wisconsin recall primary than the two Democrat candidates combined? And there was no actual need to vote for Walker at all?
As for Republicans treating women like second class citizens, what in the WORLD do you mean by that? That we aren’t letting Sandra Fluke “access” birth control? Somehow, the word “access” in some magic way being defined as “paid for by the government”? When she can buy her own damn birth control pills for $9/month at a Target store 2 miles from Georgetown?
We conservatives REVERE our women! We conservatives LOVE Sarah Palin, for instance. No, not all of the GOP are conservatives, and most conservatives vote GOP.
Someone even made a bunch of leading conservatives into superheroes:http://www.thelookingspoon.com/index.php/73-may-2012/3416-conservative-superheroines
BTW, I think you are jealous, because so many conservative women are beautiful AND smart!
lloydrmc
May 21st, 2012
10:40 pm
@MarkV -”How does giving the women the Church employs the same rights as women anywhere else prohibit the Church to exercise their religion?” Are you really as utterly ignorant as that?
1) Birth control is NOT a right. Even SCOTUS has not crossed that bridge. So how, pray tell, can someone be deprived of a right that doesn’t actually exist?
2) The Catholic Church considers birth control to be sinful. So requiring them to provide it is forcing the Church to engage in what it considers sinful behavior, which is an affront to their most basic beliefs. It’s right there in the Free Exercise clause of the FIRST Amendment to the Constitution of the United States (which you people are so wont to forget about or simply ignore).
Again I say, making the Catholic Church do something it considers sinful is in violation of the First Amendment.
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
10:46 pm
@I Report (-: You Whine )-: mmm, mmmm, mmmmm! Just sayin…
May 21st, 2012
9:29 pm
The Obama campaign’s attacks on Bain haven’t gone very well, in part because the claims are so transparently cynical. Everyone knows they’re cherry-picking facts, focusing on the rare Bain Capital failures while ignoring the successes—all in order to distract attention from the failed results of Mr. Obama’s economic policies.
obozo is the best campaign manager that Romney could ask for.
******************************************************************************************
FOR US LIBERALS……
Mit-Rob-Me was a GODSEND.
“attacks on Bain haven’t gone very wel”
THAT’S WHAT YOU THINK.
You can fool SOME of the people ALL of the time, and ALL of the people SOME of the time,
but you CANNOT fool ALL of the people ALL of the time.
WE AIN’T NO FOOLS.
td
May 21st, 2012
10:50 pm
Catholics Are Hypocrites. Where Is The Outrage Against Pedophile Catholic Priests?
May 21st, 2012
10:46 pm
“WE AIN’T NO FOOLS.”
That could really be a debatable point.