The new Kulturkampf

Just over a year ago when the Attorney General of the State of Illinois first moved to force Catholic Charities out of foster care and adoptions, His Excellency the Most Reverend Thomas John Paprocki, Bishop of Springfield in Illinois, made reference to the Kulturkampf of Otto von Bismarck.  Writing in his column in the Catholic Times, he said:

I write all this because we are seeing a different but very virulent form of Kulturkampf gaining ground here in the United States. In our American context, this has been referred to as the “Culture Wars,” which, like Germany in the 19th century, promotes a secular view of the world and seeks to diminish the role of religion and restrict the influence of Christians in general and Catholics in particular. Prominent in this secular agenda are the promotion of abortion and assaults on the traditional understanding of marriage and family life [more].

Bishop Paprocki is not the only one to make this connection.

A couple of weeks ago, His Excellency the Most Reverend Daniel R. Jenky, Bishop of Peoria, said, in a homily that has been very much taken out of context:

Remember that in past history other governments have tried to force Christians to huddle and hide only within the confines of their churches like the first disciples locked up in the Upper Room.

In the late 19th century, Bismarck waged his "Kulturkampf," a Culture War, against the Roman Catholic Church, closing down every Catholic school and hospital, convent and monastery in Imperial Germany.

Clemenceau, nicknamed "the priest eater," tried the same thing in France in the first decade of the 20th Century.

Hitler and Stalin, at their better moments, would just barely tolerate some churches remaining open, but would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services, and health care.

In clear violation of our First Amendment rights, Barack Obama - with his radical, pro abortion and extreme secularist agenda, now seems intent on following a similar path.

Now things have come to such a pass in America that this is a battle that we could lose, but before the awesome judgement seat of Almighty God this is not a war where any believing Catholic may remain neutral.

This fall, every practicing Catholic must vote, and must vote their Catholic consciences, or by the following fall our Catholic schools, our Catholic hospitals, our Catholic Newman Centers, all our public ministries -- only excepting our church buildings - could easily be shut down. Because no Catholic institution, under any circumstance, can ever cooperate with the instrinsic evil of killing innocent human life in the womb [more].

On the Square, Leroy Huizinga recently wrote of The White House's Contraceptive Kulturkampf.  In this new culture war, he sees a difference:

Unlike the war waged against Catholics in the nineteenth century by Germany’s Iron Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, a devout pietist Christian, our battle has been joined not only by many of our Evangelical brothers and sisters but also by many Mormons, Jews, and others of good will [more].

Does Sebelius understand religious liberty? No.

On April 26, 2012, Representative Trey Gowdy (R-South Carolina) questioned Secretary Sebelius regarding certain aspects of religious liberty.  Please, watch this five minute interchange and pay very close attention:

Remember, Secretary Sebelius has been tasked with creating most of the regulations that come from the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, yet she does not understand religious liberty in this nation.

There are difficult days ahead.

Paul VI was right on government interference

Back in 1968 (two years before the Food and Drug Administration of the United States of America approved "the pill"), His Holiness Pope Paul VI published his prophetic - and so-called "controversial" - encyclical Humanae Vitae on the regulation of birth.

Why did he choose at that time to speak on such an issue?  Precisely because, as he said, the questions being raised about the regulation of human birth "concern matters intimately connected with the life and happiness of human beings" (1) and because they concern marriage, the Church's teachings on which are "based on the natural law as illuminated and enriched by divine Revelation" (4).  Because marriage is found in the natural moral law, it "declares the will of God, and its faithful observance is necessary for men's eternal salvation" (4).

None of these teachings, of course, that he expounded in Humanae Vitae were new and should have not have caused any surprise or anger in anyone.

What should have alarmed people, however, were the things Pope Paul VI foresaw as the natural and dire consequences of a worldview built upon the sandy foundation of contraception:

1. infidelity within marriage and a weakening of moral values (17);
2. men would lose respect for women and use them only as objects for pleasure (17);
3. and government interference within the marital act (17);

Clearly and without doubt, his first two predictions took hold rather quickly.  And now, in recent days, we are seeing all too clearly the fulfillment of his third prediction, which he expressed in these words (with my emphases):

careful consideration should be given to the danger of this power passing into the hands of those public authorities who care little for the precepts of the moral law. Who will blame a government which in its attempt to resolve the problems affecting an entire country resorts to the same measures as are regarded as lawful by married people in the solution of a particular family difficulty? Who will prevent public authorities from favoring those contraceptive methods which they consider more effective? Should they regard this as necessary, they may even impose their use on everyone. It could well happen, therefore, that when people, either individually or in family or social life, experience the inherent difficulties of the divine law and are determined to avoid them, they may give into the hands of public authorities the power to intervene in the most personal and intimate responsibility of husband and wife.

If you have not yet read Humane Vitae, do so today.  It is neither long nor difficult.  If it has been some time since you read Humane Vitae, read it again today.

Senate votes against religious freedom

The Senate of the United States of American voted this morning on the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act introduced by Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO).  Regrettably, but perhaps not unexpectedly, the bill failed by a vote of 51-48.

Among those who voted against the legislation were 13 Catholics, even though the Act would have allowed Catholic institutions to continue their operations without violating their faith.

The Catholic Advocate has a list of the 24 Catholic Senators and how they voted.

Cardinal George: "We would love to have it ended as quickly as possible. It’s up to the government to stop the attack"

Writing in his column in the Catholic New World, His Emincence Francis Cardinal George, Archbishop of Chicago, recently considered the implications of the mandate of the Department of Health and Human Services, if it is not rescinded:

What will happen if the HHS regulations are not rescinded? A Catholic institution, so far as I can see right now, will have one of four choices: 1) secularize itself, breaking its connection to the church, her moral and social teachings and the oversight of its ministry by the local bishop. This is a form of theft. It means the church will not be permitted to have an institutional voice in public life. 2) Pay exorbitant annual fines to avoid paying for insurance policies that cover abortifacient drugs, artificial contraception and sterilization. This is not economically sustainable. 3) Sell the institution to a non-Catholic group or to a local government. 4) Close down.

None of these four options are helpful, but they do achieve the Administration's aim to remove faithful Catholics from public life.

As part of his considerations, Cardinal George distinguishes between the freedom of religion - as guaranteed by the First Ammendment - and the incorrect interpretation of that freedom as simply the freedom of worship:

The provision of health care should not demand “giving up” religious liberty. Liberty of religion is more than freedom of worship. Freedom of worship was guaranteed in the Constitution of the former Soviet Union. You could go to church, if you could find one. The church, however, could do nothing except conduct religious rites in places of worship-no schools, religious publications, health care institutions, organized charity, ministry for justice and the works of mercy that flow naturally from a living faith. All of these were co-opted by the government. We fought a long cold war to defeat that vision of society.

The Constitution does not guarantee a freedom of worship, but of religion, which encompasses the living of a moral life; religion, if it is authentic, shapes every aspect of an adherent's life.  It cannot simply be compartmentalized.

His Eminence also considers the charge that the Bishops are not respecting the so-called separation of Church and State:

The bishops would love to have the separation between church and state we thought we enjoyed just a few months ago, when we were free to run Catholic institutions in conformity with the demands of the Catholic faith, when the government couldn’t tell us which of our ministries are Catholic and which not, when the law protected rather than crushed conscience. The state is making itself into a church.

In the end, it should be remembered that "the bishops didn’t begin this dismaying conflict nor choose its timing. We would love to have it ended as quickly as possible. It’s up to the government to stop the attack."

Fr. Leo on the HHS mandate

Let your voice be heard - today!

Today is the final day to voice  your concerns and opinions to the Department of Health and Human Services regarding the mandate that will require all private health plans to cover surgical sterilizations and all FDA-approve contraceptive devices and pills, even if these are contrary to a person's conscience.

The only exemption allowed is so narrowly defined that even Jesus himself could not qualify for the exemption.

Please, let your voice be known!  Contact the HHS today and let your opposition to this mandate - which violates the freedom of religion guaranteed by the first amendment - be known.

CCI: HHS exemption threatens religious freedom

In a Letter to the Editor in the State Journal-Register, Zach Wichmann, Director of Government Relations of the Illinois Catholic Conference, addresses forthcoming changes in health care regulations, about which I posted earlier.

His letter follows, with my emphases and comments:

Headlines declared “free birth control for all” when the federal government recently issued an interim rule mandating health-care plans to cover sterilization and prescription contraceptives, including the abortifacient drug Ella. But an under-reported provision of the same rule proposed an incredibly narrow definition of religious employer for exemption from the mandate.

The Catholic Church’s teaching on the immorality of contraception and sterilization as a rejection of God’s life-giving design may lack popular support. However, our nation’s commitment to protecting the free-exercise of religion has led to long-standing conscience exemptions from mandates concerning abortion, contraception and sterilization in both federal and state law for health-care professionals, insurers and purchasers. President Barack Obama’s health-care plan, the Illinois Health Care Right of Conscience Act and the exemption of “church plans” in various federal laws are just a few examples.

But the newly defined exemption for religious belief is stricter than anything found in current federal law. Exemptions may now be unavailable to individuals or insurers and apply only to religious employers that meet the extremely narrow criteria of 1.) having the purpose of teaching religious values, 2.) primarily hiring persons who share the organizations’ religious tenets, 3.) primarily serving people who share those tenets and 4.) being a nonprofit as described in the Internal Revenue Code.

Under this proposal, an organization would not be “religious enough” if it served people of different faiths, failed to hire based on religion or did not restrict its mission to the teaching of religious values. As organizations striving to serve all people in need, Catholic hospitals, Catholic universities and Catholic social service agencies would be denied the exemption.

Astonishingly, Jesus Christ and the early Church could not qualify for the exemption. His ministry was not confined to members of the Church, nor did it consist only of preaching.

By ignoring individual conscience and attempting to determine which ministries of the Church are not “religious enough,” the federal government abrogates existing law and undermines the free-exercise protections of the First Amendment. Left unchanged, the final implementation of this provision will present an impossible dilemma: forcing the Catholic Church to either withdraw from public ministry or violate deeply held religious belief through the compelled provision of health insurance coverage for contraceptives and sterilization [which is precisely the goal of the newly defined criteria].

Illinois residents surely cannot accept this threat to religious freedom.

HHS exalts ideology over conscience and common sense

Writing yesterday on the blog of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Sister Mary Ann Walsh comments on the "in-your-face" efforts of the Department of Health and Human Services, led by Kathleen Sibelius (a Catholic) to "undermine religious freedom."

The text of her excellent post follows, with my emphases and comments:

Health and Human Services must think Catholics and other religious groups are fools [they aren't the only ones in the government who think so; remember that comment about people "clinging to their guns and religion"?].


That’s all you can think when you read HHS’s recent announcement that it may exempt the church from having to pay for contraceptive services, counseling to use them and sterilizations under the new health reform in certain circumstances. As planned now, HHS would limit the right of the church not to pay for such services in limited instances, such as when the employees involved are teaching religion and in cases where the people served are primarily Catholic [which would take away the right for the free exercise of religion guaranteed by the first amendment].

HHS’s reg conveniently ignores the underlying principle of Catholic charitable actions: we help people because we are Catholic, not because our clients are [here in Illinois, we've seen a lot of people ignoring this underlying principle with respect to adoptions and foster care]. There’s no need to show your baptismal certificate in the hospital emergency room, the parish food pantry, or the diocesan drug rehab program. Or any place else the church offers help, either.

With its new regulation, HHS seeks to force church institutions to buy contraceptives, including drugs that can disrupt an existing pregnancy, through insurance they offer their own employees. This is part of HHS’s anticipated list of preventive services for women that private insurance programs must provide under the new health reform law [if contraception is "preventive," then that must mean that pregnancy is now seen as a disease, and that means the nation is in a very disturbing frame of mind].

The exemption is limited, to say the least. The pastor in the Catholic parish doesn’t have to buy the Pill for his employees, but the religious order that runs a Catholic hospital has to foot the bill for surgical sterilizations. And diocesan Catholic Charities agencies have to use money that would be better spent on feeding the poor to underwrite services that violate church teachings.

Whatever you think of artificial birth control, HHS’s command that everyone, including churches, must pay for it exalts ideology over conscience and common sense.

Perhaps HHS is unduly influenced by lobbyists. No surprise there. Certainly a major lobbyist is Planned Parenthood, the nation’s chief proponent of contraceptive services. Contraceptive services make a lot of money for Planned Parenthood clinics, which (again no surprise) provide the “services” HHS has mandated.

HHS and Planned Parenthood are narrow in focus. Respect for religious rights isn’t likely a key concern for them. However, it ought to be a key concern for President Obama, who last year promised to respect religious rights as he garnered support from the church community to pass the health care reform act [some of us didn't think him genuine in his promise]. To assuage concerns, President Obama went so far as to issue an executive order promising that the health care reform act would not fund abortion or force people and institutions to violate their consciences [that we say wouldn't offer the protections he promised]. HHS is on its way to violating that promise [no surprise there]. For the sake of basic integrity – the President’s keeping his word and for the protection of the right to religious freedom – President Obama needs to speak up now [he hasn't done so well keeping his word until now; this would fine opportunity to show he intends to become a man of his word].