Posted on 02/27/2012 9:15:01 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Warning that the Church is being “despoiled of her institutions” as “freedom of conscience and of religion become a memory from a happier past,” Cardinal Francis George of Chicago observes that “the Catholic Church in the United States is being told she must ‘give up’ her health care institutions, her universities and many of her social service organizations.”
“So far in American history, our government has respected the freedom of individual conscience and of institutional integrity for all the many religious groups that shape our society,” he continues. “The government has not compelled them to perform or pay for what their faith tells them is immoral. That’s what we’ve meant by freedom of religion. That’s what we had believed was protected by the U.S. Constitution. Maybe we were foolish to believe so.”
Cardinal George adds:
What will happen if the HHS regulations are not rescinded?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 …“If you haven’t already purchased the Archdiocesan Directory for 2012, I would suggest you get one as a souvenir,” he continued. “On page L-3, there is a complete list of Catholic hospitals and health care institutions in Cook and Lake counties. Each entry represents much sacrifice on the part of medical personnel, administrators and religious sponsors. Each name signifies the love of Christ to people of all classes and races and religions. Two Lents from now, unless something changes, that page will be blank.”
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 strangest accusation in this manipulated public discussion has the bishops not respecting the separation between 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.
As a Catholic, I think this is the wrong response. Or at least it appears that way to me.
The leaders of the RC church should tell the Federal government they will not obey the order. The church ought to keep the hospitals open and refuse to pay a fine to the US gov’t. This would force the government to literally assume the ownership by force against a religous group.
Citizens need to call the government’s bluff here and risk going to jail over it. How would the gen’l population feel if the jails were full of Christians of all stripes being arrested and thrown into jails simply because they oppose this Obamacare mandate????
Witnesses for the faith by going to jail are a good tool against imperial edicts coming from our government.
I agree.
Everyone should go about business as usual.
Call their bluff.
Are they really going to raid the hospitals and the schools?
Really?
That’s the day they will lose everything.
I read that - it’s a good post. I’m reading her blog every day now.
What she’s suggesting ties in with what Gumdrop is saying in post #40 of this thread.
Amen thank you for finally saying it. That is the only option.
“But warts and all, not one of them is an America hating Communist. Not even close. Not even if you put together the worst aspects of each.”
You are SO right!
The court, will in June render unto us there decision, whether we shall serve Man or God.
As for me and my household, we shall serve God.
Do you think Russia, or China, or any number of lesser countries would remain neutral? I am not at all encouraged by the thought.
Would they really inspect a students lunch for compliance?
Would they mail condoms to children’s homes in plain envelopes?
Would they really arrest a man and strip search him because his three year old daughter drew a picture of a Gun?
Would they really send a swat team to a mans house and arrest him because his lobsters were not packed in the proper box, then send him to jail for six and a half years?
Would they really invade a man’s property and declare it a wetland because he cleaned out a drainage ditch?
Wake up people they are doing this stuff every day.
sure they would...and it’s a bit like the frog in the boiling water. An outrage here...an insult there.
But the populace as a whole still seems to be yawning.
I don’t think they’ll yawn when the feds barge into hospitals and shut them down - not when they’re trying to sell the public on their (false) message that they’re trying to increase everyone’s access to healthcare.
Well that’s not a bad idea!!!!!
Yes, they would sttay very much neutral.
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