"This Is News from WORLD Magazine": Afghan war end date set, NAACP comes out for gay marriage - black pastors push back 
Click to Print
Include Comments
White House refuses to expand religious exemption from contraceptive mandate
WASHINGTON—Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’ comment in August that not covering contraceptives “would be like not covering flu shots” should have been a clue to what was coming.
On Friday the Obama administration announced it would not change the new healthcare law’s requirement that most religious groups provide their employees with coverage for contraceptives, including abortifacients like Plan B and Ella. The only exemption from the requirement is for groups that have the “inculcation of religious values” as their primary mission and who serve and employ people of that faith—which essentially only covers churches.
“This decision was made after very careful consideration, including the important concerns some have raised about religious liberty,” Sebelius said in a statement Friday. “I believe this proposal strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services.”
Sebelius, White House adviser Valerie Jarrett, and the head of the White House faith-based office, Joshua Dubois, held a conference call Friday with various interested parties, including some leaders in the religious community, to explain the rule, which had been under a period of review.
Religious groups that already cover contraceptives in their healthcare plans must continue to do so. Therefore, if a religious group that objects to funding contraceptives hasn’t read its own insurance policy but now discovers that it offers such coverage, then tough luck. The groups that don’t provide contraceptives will receive an extra year’s extension to decide what to do before the requirement takes effect, giving them until August 2013. Employers that do not cover contraceptives must provide information to employees about where contraceptives are available.
Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice America, and some Democrats on Capitol Hill had lobbied the administration furiously in the last few months to keep the contraceptive mandate as is, without expanding the religious exemption. … MORE >>
back to top22 Comments to “White House refuses to expand religious exemption from contraceptive mandate”
Mr. Obama war on the Christain Faith is shown again.
Report comment to moderator
Yet another reason we must dislodge this president. If he gets re-elected expect more of the same and more erosion of our rights and promotion of the pro-death movement.
Report comment to moderator
They’re forgetting there are several issues here: One, that some birth control can act as an early abortion-inducer; two, that some religious groups have an issue with birth control even if it isn’t; three, that many organizations have strong objections to providing birth control to unmarried women, and basically subsidizing sin.
It really doesn’t matter that the government thinks single people are entitled to birth control; an organization has every right to choose not to pay for things that go against their moral convictions.
Report comment to moderator
Oh yes . . . and it’s also perfectly legitimate to say that “birth control” isn’t a health issue; if a couple wants it, they can pay for it themselves!
Report comment to moderator
While I am against abortificants and abortions I am going to take the other side of this argument. There was a time in my life I used birth control and I paid for it EVEN WITH insurance.
I want abortions treated as out patient surgery if they are kept legal.
If insurance won’t pay for birth control then I was them to stop paying for Viagra.
Report comment to moderator
Somebody ought to sue.
Report comment to moderator
I’m with Kim here (big surprise)
1) the pill has legitimate medical uses beyond contraception and thus should be included in a manner similar to any pharmaceutical product.
2) Viagra is covered by most prescription drug plans. I wonder if many of the religious organizations who don’t want plans which cover the Pill have plans which cover Viagra. Other then enabling or enhancing performance, Viagra has no medical purpose.
Report comment to moderator
Viagra lowers blood pressure.
Report comment to moderator
An aside, isn’t it strange that there is disagreement about whether birth control should be covered by medical plans.
The question should be why the government should have any say in what a medical plan covers. That should be up to the buyer as to what they choose to buy, that is, which coverages.
This is what is wrong with Obamacare.
Report comment to moderator
Another thing wrong with Obamacare, All medical care workers will have to work for one employer, the US government. They will be told everything!
Consumers will have no choice about anything medical. The draft is gone. The US government lost that power. Why would anyone want to give that power back to the government?
Report comment to moderator
Please, if you would, remember Washington state in your prayers. Our legislators are currently considering a bill that would mandate insurance companies to pay for abortions. It’s not looking good, but nothing is impossible with God. Our district’s representative attends our parish and his heart is anguished over the direction our state seems intent on heading (gay marriage is also close to passing).
Report comment to moderator
These protests strike me as a bit disingenuous.
First, few religious employers are self-insured. Rather, they are part of large pools that include religious and non-religious employers. Therefore, even if the religious exemptions were broadened, religious employers would still be funding procedures that that they deem objectionable. They’d just be funding them for other companies’ employees and not their own. In fact, that’s exactly what they’re doing now…without much of an objection.
Second, religious employers can legally require their employees to abide by certain moral codes. For example, a Christian college may legally require employees to agree to abstain from contraceptive use. Therefore, there’s little chance that religious employers will end up paying for their employees to obtain medical treatment that contravenes the school’s code of conduct (unless employees and their families are violating the employer’s code of conduct).
There are thousands of different religious groups in the US. It would be burdensome on insurance providers to design a varying array of insurance packages that are tailored to the moral predilections of each religious group. If religious employers are concerned about subsidizing employees’ sin through health insurance premiums, then it’s far easier to accomplish this via private employment contracts.
I suspect that these objectors know this. Thus, the “issue” is not really the issue. Rather, it strikes me that this is another foolish attempt by Christian groups to suggest that the Obama health-care act runs afoul of Biblical teaching. I am not a fan of the new health-care law. But I object to it because I believe that it’s economically unsound. I don’t believe that the Bible has anything to say either in favor of the health-care law or against it. Liberty University and Colorado Christian College would be better served if they spent their students’ tuition money on things that directly benefit their paying customers.
Report comment to moderator
10. Bingo.
Report comment to moderator
“There are thousands of different religious groups in the US. It would be burdensome on insurance providers to design a varying array of insurance packages that are tailored to the moral predilections of each religious group.”
That doesn’t seem to be a problem now.
Report comment to moderator
KBells:
That was my point in the first paragraph. Health insurance is currently regulated at the state level. I don’t know the exact numbers, but I’m not aware of too many states (if any) that have laws or regulations that mandate that health-insurance providers offer policies tailored to religious employers’ moral predilections. Thus, most religious employers are already paying for insurance plans that cover procedures that they deem to be morally objectionable…and have been doing so for years.
This “issue” has nothing to do with anyone’s conscience; it has everything to do with election-year politics. It’s just one more ham-fisted attempt by evangelicals to paint the GOP as the “party of Christ” and the Dems as the “party of Satan.”
Report comment to moderator
Actually, I’ve read that many Catholic organizations are NOT paying for birth control or abortion in their insurance policies. That’s entirely between the insurance company and the purchaser…in a free market where there is no government interference. That was part of the objection in Obamacare because these services would be receiving subsidies through the state sponsored insurance pool.
Report comment to moderator
“There are thousands of different religious groups in the US. It would be burdensome on insurance providers to design a varying array of insurance packages that are tailored to the moral predilections of each religious group.”
It’s called expanding your product line to meet a market demand. Why is that “burdensome?” Why is that more “burdensome” than having to re-engineer cars to meet efficiency and safety standards, which the government has no problem mandating?
Besides, there are not thousands of different variants on what the conscience allows in the way of medical care. With/without abortion coverage, with/without abortifacient birth control coverage, with/without all birth control coverage, and with/without blood transfusion coverage. Those and their combinations probably cover every possible variant actually existing in the U.S. That’s hardly a large increase on the huge menu of coverages based on price, network, location, etc., that already exist.
Report comment to moderator
15. I meant that doesn’t seem to be a problem for the Insurance companies now. They are doing that. I know I worked for Catholics for 19 years and I assure you they would have shut down before paying for insurance that covered birth control.
Report comment to moderator
I agree with Kim as well.
also
Plan B isn’t the/a abortion pill, it prevents pregnancy from ever occurring, Mifeprex is the abortion pill which will abort a fetus that is 8 weeks along or less. +/-
Report comment to moderator
“If insurance won’t pay for birth control then I was them to stop paying for Viagra.”
If the employer doesn’t want to pay for Viagra than he shouldn’t, same with birth control.
Report comment to moderator
19. The catholic church has a moral problem with all birth control. I don’t necessarily agree with them but that is their right to believe that. It should also be their right not to have to pay for things their violate their conscience. This is one of the things you need to take into consideration before you take the job.
Report comment to moderator
So much for freedom. You all want Americans to be free — right up until the point they want to use their freedom in a way you don’t approve. Then you want someone in authority — employers and insurers in this case — to be able to curtail their freedom.
Report comment to moderator
back to topJoin The Conversation
You need to be a registered user of WORLDmag.com's Community section to "join the conversation."
If you are not a member yet, what are you waiting for? Register / Login Now!