Posted on 01/31/2012 7:15:03 AM PST by Dqban22
Pittsburgh Bishop Zubik: 'To Hell' With New Contraception Rules
The Obama administration is requiring church-affiliated employers to provide health care plans that cover access to contraception.
By Larissa Dudkiewicz Email the author January 29, 2012
Pittsburgh Catholic Bishop David Zubik Friday joined a growing segment of religious leaders speaking out against the Obama administration’s new law that requires religious employers to offer health plans covering free contraceptives.
In an open letter titled "To Hell With You," Zubik on Friday characterized some of the mandates in the administration’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as a "slap in the face" and an attack on religious freedom.
Zubik specifcally refers to guidelines that require all individual and group health insurance plans, including self-insured plans, to cover FDA-approved contraception, sterilization procedures and pharmaceuticals "that even result in abortion," Zubik writes.
"The Obama administration has just told the Catholics of the United States, “To Hell with you!” There is no other way to put it," Zubik wrote in the letter posted on the Pittsburgh Diocese website.
The church opposes contraception and pharmaceuticals such as the "morning-after" pill.
Under the law, Zubik believes many Catholic institutions would be affected, including local schools and churches.
Zubik writes: Practically speaking under the proposed mandate there would be no “religious exemption” for Catholic hospitals universities, colleges, nursing homes and numerous Catholic social service agencies such as Catholic Charities. It could easily be determined that the “religious exemption” would not apply as well to Catholic high schools, elementary schools and Catholic parishes since many employ non-Catholics and serve both students and, through social outreach, many who do not share Catholic religious beliefs. Such a narrow “religious exemption” is simply unprecedented in federal law.
Zubik's letter urges Catholics to contact their local political leaders and lists several names and numbers for the White House, Pennsylvania Congressmen and Senators.
And I wonder if Bishop Zubik voted for Obama in 2008? My guess is, yes.
I wonder if Bishop Zubik will vote for Obama in 2012?
The supreme Satin in the Whitehut does not care a whit about what the RC Church says.
The schools in Rochester NY (My hometown) are now handing out condoms to the students. My take is that it's merely a Planned Parenthood base. Disgusting!!
From his letter in 2009:Shout a little softer archived from: 2009-08-24 by: Bishop David Zubik
We, the United States bishops, have for years called for health care reform that provides access to quality care for all, and I emphasize everyone, particularly the poor and immigrants, always respectful of human life at all stages. Health care reform is something that we must have so that no one — no one — in our great country is turned away at a time of medical need.
Ooops, he forgot that in a command economy, the government gets to call the shots.
If I were the CHURCH, I would simply say NOOOOOOOOOO.
Wha is Obama going to do, send the FBI out to arrest Priests and Bishops?
One thing about Obama and his crew - they are statists and totalitarians, but they are also spineless political cowards.
My advise to the Bishops - simply IGNORE Obama and HHS on this. Say NO, loudly, publicly, and challenge them do their worst in response. They will back-down.
First Amendment: “Congress shall make NO LAW RESPECTING AN ESTABLISHMENT OF RELIGION, OR PROHIBITING THE FREE EXERCISE THEREOF; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Emphasis mine.
I AGREE.....
I am sure bishop Zubik did not vote for Obama, he has always been against abortion. Nevertheless, it is true that many bishops shamefully vote for Obama.
I never thought about it, but if I were making a bet I would say the Bishop probably did vote for Obama.
Not only that a lot of other Catholics did, and still will.
I don't know this bishop, so I can't say anything about his politics, but I would imagine the number of Catholics who are religiously opposed to birth control who actually voted for Obama could dance on the head of a pin.
I also know from experience and from reading that the number of churchgoing (active) Catholics who voted for Obama are dwarfed by the same demographic who vote life (which is typically Republican, but certainly not Obama).
I don’t know where you get your opinion, but I disagree with it.
Black Catholics voted for Obama in spite of their anti-abortion stance if they had one. Many Democrats voted party and voted Obama in spite of being Catholics.
IMO few Catholics are very religious any longer with probably less than half who bother to go to confession any longer.
Most Catholics use some form of Birth Control NOW in spite of the Church’s edict on it.
I like the way you think, but I believe you are wrong.
‘To Hell With You’ By Bishop David A. Zubik
HHS delays rule on contraceptive coverage
Decision unchanged on HHS exemptions
HHS Edict Will Force Catholics to Violate Conscience
It is really hard to believe that it happened. It comes like a slap in the face. The Obama administration has just told the Catholics of the United States, “To Hell with you!” There is no other way to put it.
In early August, the Department for Health and Human Services in the Obama administration released guidelines as part of the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The guidelines mandated that by Summer 2012 all individual and group health insurance plans, including self-insured plans, cover all FDA-approved contraception, sterilization procedures and pharmaceuticals that even result in abortion.
A million things are wrong with this: equating pregnancy with disease; mandating that every employer pay for contraception procedures including alleged contraceptives that are actually abortion-inducing drugs; forcing American citizens to chose between violating their consciences or providing health care services; mandating such coverage on every individual woman without allowing her to even choose not to have it; forcing every person to pay for that coverage no matter the dictates of their conscience.
Let’s be blunt. This whole process of mandating these guidelines undermines the democratic process itself. In this instance, the mandate declares pregnancy a disease, forces a culture of contraception and abortion on society, all while completely bypassing the legislative process.
This is government by fiat that attacks the rights of everyone – not only Catholics; not only people of all religion. At no other time in memory or history has there been such a governmental intrusion on freedom not only with regard to religion, but even across-the-board with all citizens. It forces every employer to subsidize an ideology or pay a penalty while searching for alternatives to health care coverage. It undermines the whole concept and hope for health care reform by inextricably linking it to the zealotry of pro-abortion bureaucrats.
For our Church this mandate would apply in virtually every instance where the Catholic Church serves as an employer. The mandate would require the Catholic Church as an employer to violate its fundamental beliefs concerning human life and human dignity by forcing Catholic entities to provide contraceptive, sterilization coverage and even pharmaceuticals that result in abortion.
There was a so-called “religious exemption” to the mandate, but it was so narrowly drawn that, as critics charged, Jesus Christ and his Apostles would not fit the exemption. The so-called exemption would only apply to the vast array of Catholic institutions where the following applied:
• Only Catholics are employed;
• The primary purpose of the institution or service provided is the direct instruction in Catholic belief;
• The only persons served by the institution are those that share Catholic religious tenets. (Try to fit this in with our local Catholic Charities that serve 80,000 every year without discrimination according to faith. It would be impossible!)
Practically speaking under the proposed mandate there would be no “religious exemption” for Catholic hospitals universities, colleges, nursing homes and numerous Catholic social service agencies such as Catholic Charities. It could easily be determined that the “religious exemption” would not apply as well to Catholic high schools, elementary schools and Catholic parishes since many employ non-Catholics and serve both students and, through social outreach, many who do not share Catholic religious beliefs. Such a narrow “religious exemption” is simply unprecedented in federal law.
Last September I asked you to protest those guidelines to Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the U.S. Department for Health and Human Services, and contact your political leadership in the federal government. I asked that you request that this flawed mandate be withdrawn because of its unprecedented interference in the religious liberty and freedom of conscience of the Catholic community, and our basic democratic process.
You did. And you were joined by Catholics throughout the country (and many others as well) who raised their voices against the mandate, raised their voices against a meaningless religious exemption.
On January 20, 2012, the Obama administration answered you and me. The response was very simple: “To Hell with You.”
Kathleen Sebelius announced that the mandate would not be withdrawn and the religious exemption would not be expanded. Instead, she stated that nonprofit groups – which include the Catholic Church – will get a year “to adapt to this new rule.” She simply dismissed Catholic concerns as standing in the way of allegedly respecting the health concerns and choices of women.
Could Catholics be insulted any more, suggesting that we have no concern for women’s health issues? The Catholic Church and the Catholic people have erected health care facilities that are recognized worldwide for their compassionate care for everyone regardless of their creed, their economic circumstances and, most certainly, their gender. In so many parts of the globe – the United States included – the Church is health care.
Kathleen Sebelius and through her, the Obama administration, have said “To Hell with You” to the Catholic faithful of the United States.
• To Hell with your religious beliefs,
• To Hell with your religious liberty,
• To Hell with your freedom of conscience.
We’ll give you a year, they are saying, and then you have to knuckle under. As Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops responded, “in effect, the president is saying that we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences.”
As I wrote to you last September, with this mandate the democratic process is being ignored while we are being ordered to ignore our religious beliefs. And we are being told not only to violate our beliefs, but to pay directly for that violation; to subsidize the imposition of a contraceptive and abortion culture on every person in the United States.
It is time to go back to work. They have given us a year to adapt to this rule. We can’t! We simply cannot!
Write to the president.
Write to Secretary Sebelius.
Write to our Senators.
Write to those in Congress.
Use the PA Catholic Advocacy Network to send an email message, too.
I have included the addresses in a box accompanying this article. Here’s what you can write:
“Dear (Representative):
“In early August, the Department for Health and Human Services released guidelines that would force Catholic institutions to subsidize through their health care plans contraception, sterilization procedures and pharmaceuticals that even result in abortion.
“It was announced on January 20thby Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the U.S. Department for Health and Human Services, that this mandate is affirmed and that non-profit institutions, including the Catholic Church, have one year to adapt to the mandate.
“This is a direct threat to the religious liberty of Catholics, freedom of conscience and the social service ministry of the Catholic Church. The so-called ‘religious exemption’ in the mandate is no exemption at all as it would require any Catholic institution (that serves non-Catholics or employs non-Catholics) to violate Catholic belief, discontinue to provide health care, or close its doors.
“I ask that you do all possible to rescind the ‘Preventive Service Mandate’ as an unprecedented federal interference in the right of Catholics to serve their community without violating their fundamental moral beliefs.”
This mandate can be changed by Congressional pressure. The only way that action will happen is if you and I take action.
Let them know that you and I will not allow ourselves to be pushed around (or worse yet) be dismissed because of our Catholic faith.
Let them know that you and I will not allow our religious freedom to be compromised.
Let them know that you and I will not allow our religious liberty to be rescinded.
Nobody, not even the president of the United States or anyone who represents him, has the right to say to you and to me as U.S. citizens, as Catholics, or as both: “To Hell with You.”
The president and our elected leaders need to hear from you and me and to listen to us NOW.
And if NOT now, HOW can we get the president to listen to us???
Contact your political leaders
President Barack Obama, The White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20500 (202-456-1111).
U.S. Rep. Jason Altmire, 332 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515 (202-225-2565), D-PA District 4.
U.S. Rep. Mark Critz, 1022 Longworth House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515 (202-225-2065), D-PA District 12.
U.S. Rep. Mike Doyle, 401 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515 (202-225-2135), D-PA District 14.
U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly, 515 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515 (202-225-5406), R-PA District 3.
U.S. Rep. Timothy Murphy, 322 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515 (202-225-2301), R-PA District 18.
U.S. Sen. Robert Casey Jr., 393 Russell Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510 (202-224-6324), D-PA.
U.S. Sen. Patrick Toomey, 502 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510 (202-224-4254), R-PA.
________________________________________
HHS delays rule on contraceptive coverage
But decision unchanged on exemptions
Nancy Frazier O’Brien
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON— Although Catholic leaders vowed to fight on, the Obama administration has turned down repeated requests from Catholic bishops, hospitals, schools and charitable organizations to revise its religious exemption to the requirement that all health plans cover contraceptives and sterilization free of charge.
Instead, Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, announced Jan. 20 that nonprofit groups that do not provide contraceptive coverage because of their religious beliefs will get an additional year “to adapt to this new rule.”
“This decision was made after very careful consideration, including the important concerns some have raised about religious liberty,” Sebelius said. “I believe this proposal strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services.”
But Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the Obama administration had “drawn an unprecedented line in the sand” with the decision.
“The Catholic bishops are committed to working with our fellow Americans to reform the law and change this unjust regulation,” he added. “We will continue to study all the implications of this troubling decision.”
U.S. Cardinal-designate Edwin O’Brien, pro-grand master of the Knights of the Holy Sepulcher and apostolic administrator of the Baltimore Archdiocese, called the decision “shocking and disturbing” in a Jan. 20 statement from Rome.
Saying it would force individuals and religious organizations “to surrender their beliefs — rooted in long-held Judeo-Christian tradition and practice — for the sake of political and financial expediency,” he called on Catholics “to pray for our elected officials and to work to reform this unjust regulation.”
Sebelius announced the mandate and a narrow religious exemption to it Aug. 1, 2011. Under the plan, after Aug. 1 of this year, new or significantly altered health plans will be required to provide all FDA-approved contraceptives, including some that can cause abortions, without co-pays or deductibles as part of preventive health care for women.
The only religious organizations exempt from the requirement would be those meeting four specific criteria — “(1) has the inculcation of religious values as its purpose; (2) primarily employs persons who share its religious tenets; (3) primarily serves persons who share its religious tenets; and (4) is a nonprofit organization” under specific sections of the Internal Revenue Code.
Those sections “refer to churches, their integrated auxiliaries, and conventions or associations of churches, as well as to the exclusively religious activities of any religious orders,” according to a footnote to the interim final rule.
Catholic groups, including the USCCB, the Catholic Health Association and Catholic Charities USA, called that exemption too narrow, saying it would require Catholic groups to stop all services to those who were not Catholic and would inappropriately involve the government in decisions about whether an organization is “religious enough” to be exempted.
“As it stands, it is unlikely that any Catholic college or university will be exempt,” said Michael Galligan-Stierle, president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities.
Sebelius’ announcement brought an outcry from Catholic leaders and a sigh of relief from groups such as Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice America, which had opposed any moves to weaken the contraceptive mandate or strengthen the religious exemption.
In a video posted on the USCCB website, Cardinal-designate Dolan said the decision put the Obama administration “on the wrong side of the Constitution” and should be rescinded.
“In effect, the president is saying we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences,” the cardinal-designate said in a separate statement. “To force American citizens to choose between violating their consciences and forgoing their health care is literally unconscionable. It is as much an attack on access to health care as on religious freedom. Historically this represents a challenge and a compromise of our religious liberty.”
Sister Carol Keehan, a Daughter of Charity who is president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association, said the announcement was a “missed opportunity to be clear on appropriate conscience protection.”
“The challenge that these regulations posed for many groups remains unresolved,” she added. “This indicates the need for an effective national conversation on the appropriate conscience protections in our pluralistic country, which has always respected the role of religions.”
Father Larry Snyder, president of Catholic Charities USA, said he was “extremely disappointed” that the administration chose to ignore calls from religious institutions to broaden the exemption.
“With the existing restrictive definition in this mandate, the ministry of Jesus Christ himself would not be considered a religious entity,” he said.
“Just as the identity of Catholic Charities is firmly rooted in the teaching of its church, the identity of this nation includes a mandated respect of religious beliefs,” Father Snyder added. “It is this long-standing history that gave us hope that as a religious institution we would be granted the freedom to remain faithful to our beliefs while also being committed to providing access to quality health care for our 70,000 employees and their families across the country.”
Pope hits out at 'radical secularism'
‘We Will Not Comply’: Catholic Leaders Distribute Letter Slamming Obama Admin Contraceptive Mandate
‘We Will Not Comply’: Catholic Leaders Distribute Letter Slamming Obama Admin Contraceptive Mandate
Bruskewitz: Fight Insurance Ruling [Sebelius a "bitter, fallen away Catholic"]
Letter from Archbishop John G. Vlazny on the matter of freedom of conscience and decisions by HHS
Bishop Olmsted's Letter to Catholics [Catholic Caucus]
Liberty for the Amish & Quakers but not Catholics. . .
Contraception mandate prompts Peoria bishop to instate St. Michael Prayer (Catholic Caucus)
Phoenix bishop (Olmstead): defy feds on birth control
A letter from Archbishop Dennis M. Schnurr concerning HHS edict
Speak honestly: abortion is ‘the killing of tiny human beings in the womb’ – Denver bishop
Bishop [Daniel Jenky] Blasts Secularist Intolerance, Calls For ‘Assertive Action’ to Defend Church
(Pittsburgh Bishop Zubik comments:) HHS delays rule on contraceptive coverage
Dolan: Natural law, not religious preference, dictates all life sacred
Religious leaders blast HHS over contraception mandate
Mandated Contraception, Sterilization: Caesar Demands Church Violate Conscience
OBAMA’S CONTEMPT FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTY (mandates coverage of sterilization & contraception)
Implications of Obama Admin move to force Cath hospitals to provide contraception and sterilizations
Catholic doctors’ group launches petition against contraception mandate
Contraception mandate tramples religious freedom, US bishops say
Catholics hear anti-Obama letter in church (Some idiots wanted "change" so they got it)
Has Obama Lost the Catholic Left?
Obama Receives 77% of Jewish Vote-- More Than Kerry
White US Catholics move toward GOP, Hispanic Catholics toward Democrats
Among Catholics, Obama job approval rating decreases to 50 percent
Obama Tells The Catholic Church To Go To Hell
1/31/2012
My Catholic priest, Father Larry Swink, delivered a homily on Sunday that I told him would make headlines. In the toughest sermon I have ever heard from a pulpit, he attacked the Obama Administration as evil, even demonic, and warned of religious persecution ahead. What was also newsworthy about the sermon was that he cited The Washington Post in agreement—not on the subject of the Obama Administration being evil, but on the matter of its abridgment of the constitutional right to freedom of religion.
What is happening is extraordinary and unprecedented. The Catholic Church is in open revolt against the Obama Administration, with Fr. Swink noting from the pulpit that priests across the archdiocese were joining the call on Sunday to rally Catholics to resistance against the U.S. Government. He said we are entering a time of religious persecution and that Catholics and others will have to make a final decision about which side they are on.
The issue is what the Catholic Bishops have called a “literally unconscionable” edict by the Obama Administration demanding that sterilization, abortifacients and contraception be included in virtually all health plans.
At a time when the media are full of reports about who is ahead and behind in the polls, and who will win the next Republican presidential primary, this incredible uprising in the Catholic Church is something that could not only overshadow the political campaign season, but also may have a major impact on the ultimate outcome—if Republicans know how to handle it. This matter goes beyond partisan politics to the growing perception of an unconstitutional Obama Administration assault on religious freedom. To hear the Catholic Bishops and Priests describe it, our constitutional republic and our freedoms hang in the balance.
Memo to the Catholic Bishops
By Hugh Hewitt
2/2/2012
To the Members of the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops:
It may have taken a few days to sink in, but by now you should all have realized that President Obama has opened a massive assault on the Roman Catholic Church in America the likes of which none of you have ever experienced and for which few of you have prepared.
My guess is only a handful of you believed it could come to this. This is America; after all, where the “first freedom” listed in the First Amendment is religious freedom. When next you gather you might usefully conduct a poll as to how many really believed such a thing could happen.
Most of you are good men, and some extremely good men, but you have never been in a struggle with the government the likes of which your brothers in other places have endured. The American government has always been at least an ally of the Church’s social teachings, right? Sure, there is the problem of some Democrats pushing for late-term abortions, and of some academics arguing that the tax exempt status of all churches is an unconstitutional “establishment of religion.”
But you just laughed off the idea that the government could actually threaten your very existence.
That is, however, what has happened with the promulgation.
“What came down was the most sweeping and restrictive set of regulations that we’ve seen,” Atlanta Archbishop Wilton Gregory said of the new Health and Human Services Department regulations mandating that all health insurance plans provide for contraception, including sterilization and the “morning after” pill.
“We cannot —we will not— comply with this unjust law, declared Archbishop Olmsted in Phoenix, in a bold letter to his flock that implied what former United States Senator Rick Santorum openly declared the only option on my radio program Wednesday: “Civil disobedience.”
Here is my full exchange with Senator Santorum on the subject:
HH: I read the letter from Archbishop Olmsted of Phoenix on the air. Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles has written a new article in First Things. It’s shocking, actually, what’s going on. Should this be a centerpiece of whoever the nominee’s campaign is?
RS: I talked about it in every speech I’ve given today. And here’s what I said, though, Hugh. I said that I took issue with the Catholic Bishops Conference, because Hugh, you may remember, they embraced Obamacare.
HH: Yes.
RS: They embraced it and said…here’s what I said to them. Be careful when you have government saying that they can give you rights, that you have a right to health care, and government’s going to give you something, because once you are now dependant on government, they, not only can they take that right away, they can tell you how to exercise that right, and you can either like it or not. And that’s the problem. That’s what the Catholic Bishops Conference didn’t get, that there’s no free lunch here, folks. If you’re going to give people secular power, then they’re going to use it in a secular fashion. And that’s why, you know, I hate to say it, but you know, you had it coming. And it’s time to wake up and realize that government isn’t the answer to the social ills. It’s people of faith, and it’s families, and it’s communities, and it’s charities that need to do this as it has in America so successfully for so long.
HH: Rick Santorum, what do you advise Catholic hospitals, Catholic colleges, Catholic…the centers of poverty assistance, the adoption agencies? What do you advise them to do in the face of, as Archbishop Olmsted said, we cannot comply with this unjust law?
RS: Civil disobedience. This will not stand. There’s no way they can make this stand. The Supreme Court, eventually, this thing’s going to get to the Supreme Court just like the ministerial hiring issue that was just decided by the Supreme Court the other day. And it was a 9-0 decision that said the Obama administration can’t roll over people of faith when it comes to hiring. Yet in the face of that decision, this radical, secular government of Barack Obama continues to have faith be the least important of the 1st Amendment. And I just think they fight. They fight in the courts, and they fight by civil disobedience, and go to war with the federal government over this one.
Talk about tough love. Senator Santorum says it straight, and the taste is bitter. You were played. The left took your support for nationalizing health care and repaid your support with a conscience-enslaving requirement that the Roman Catholic Church pay for contraception, sterilization and “the morning-after pill.”
Give it a year. The president’s appointees will have you paying for abortions. That or pay the price of civil disobedience.
What that price might be is still vague. Fines and penalties? Loss of tax exempt status? Who knows? But keep in mind that this gang blindsided you on the regs, and they will work with Eric Holder’s Department of Justice to blindside you on the enforcement as well. Payback time for all those Right to Life Marches and the controversies over who should receive the Eucharist.
To paraphrase the old saying, “Paybacks are (on the road to) Hell.”
The central question is what will you do, and not next quarter or even next month, but right now? Sure, the letters went out, and appeals to the faithful have been made. Lawsuits are probably being explored. (They ought to have been filed yesterday, in the federal district court in the D.C. Circuit. Time’s a wasting.)
But what are you going to do in the realm of politics. This isn’t even a question of defending your own Church but of your duty to defend the unborn and the right of conscience and the free exercise of faith.
There is one step you must take.
You have to consider issuing a declaration obliging American Roman Catholics of good conscience to vote against the re-election of the president and every member of his party at every level. Do you want the regulations revoked? Then this is what you must do, and soon.
The Manhattan-Beltway elite media will shriek. The professional atheists and their allies who are your long-time opponents will scream. But if you are serious about your job of defending the faith, this is what you must do.
Whatever you decide to do, you need a media strategy much better than the one deployed in fits and starts across the country. Most Catholics are even now unaware of what just happened. Letters from the pulpit? That’s it?
A suggestion: Task a cross section of senior bishops from cross the country, say Archbishop Dolan of New York, Chaput of Philadelphia, Olmsted of Phoenix and Gomez of Los Angeles, and dispatch them on a tour of many cities, at each stop holding a press conference and explaining what has happened and how they will be back with the specific resolutions adopted by the Conference.
“[Go to war with the federal government over this one,” is how Senator Santorum put it, by which of course he meant the sort of non-violent war that Occupy protestors excel at before they become violent.
The bad news is that you are very timid by nature, lulled into complacency by a tradition of religious freedom that didn’t exist when Charles Carroll risked all his massive land and wealth to sign the Declaration of Independence.
You are far from media savvy, and you are afraid of offending some Democrats in the pews. Get over it, or get over the Church’s teachings, as it really has come down to a choice that cannot be postponed.
This is not your father’s Democratic Party. This isn’t even your Democratic Party, those of you who grew up proud of John F. Kennedy and even happy proponents of the Bishops’ letters of the 1980s castigating Ronald Reagan on economics and defense issues.
These people want to destroy you, and behind their soft smiles and long meetings and densely-written regulations, there is an agenda, and your submission to the cultural values of the left is on it. Where was the president when this went on? Do you really think he didn’t sign off on this? Has he returned any of your calls? Did you even try to call him?
Or did some in your number immediately set about figuring out why there was nothing you could do?
Understand, you could have this regulation pulled in a matte of days or weeks. But you would have to be bold, blunt and unwilling to “compromise.” And you would have to go public against the president.
So, are you shepherds, or not? If so, protect your flocks.
Note by dqban22:
On 28 October 1933 Bishop von Galen was consecrated
Archbishop of Cologne; Bishop von Galen was the first diocesan Bishop to be consecrated under Hitler’s regime.
As his motto, he chose the formula of the rite of episcopal consecration: “Nec laudibus, nec timore” (Neither praise nor threats will distance me from God).
Throughout the 20 years that Bishop von Galen was curate and parish priest in Berlin, he wrote on various political and social issues; in a pastoral letter dated 26 March 1934, he wrote very clearly and critically on the “neopaganism of the national socialist ideology”.
On 14 March 1937 the Encyclical “Mit brennender Sorge” (To the Bishops of Germany: The place of the Catholic Church in the German Reich) was published. It was widely circulated by Bishop von Galen, notwithstanding Nazi opposition.
“Lion of Munster’
In the summer of 1941, in answer to unwarranted attacks by the National Socialists, Bishop von Galen delivered three admonitory sermons between July and August. He spoke in his old parish Church of St Lambert and in Liebfrauen-Ueberlassen Church, since the diocesan cathedral had been bombed.
In his famous speeches, Bishop von Galen spoke out against the State euthanasia program carried out by the regime against the handicap and the mentally retarded.
Are the American Bishops going to be less courageous confronting Obama than the German Bishops were in defending the attacks against the main tenets of the Catholic faith by Adolph Hitler?
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