Free Republic

Rights: The House Minority Leader says self-insurance is no protection against the government's contraceptive mandate, while California's junior senator says people have a right to be insured but no right to practice their faith. Lost in the phony "compromise" on the Health and Human Services mandate on religious institutions being forced to pay for contraceptive services was the fact that many such institutions are self-insured. So making insurance companies pay instead is a distinction without a difference. Sometimes these religious institutions are their own insurance company. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who once complained that her fellow Catholics had this...

Remember, the "compromise�" is that insurance companies will foot the bill for contraception themselves so that religious institutions technically aren't paying for it. That's a minor concession given that the plan will still cover birth control — and it's a nonexistent concession if premiums end up rising to pay for the contraception — but that was the compromise. One wrinkle: What happens if the religious institution is the insurance company, i.e. if it self-insures? Surely they get a conscience exemption in that case, right?Right? House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said Thursday morning that the government should require self-insured religious institutions,...

A fascinating theory has been advanced by Dick Morris, which, in turn, is being considered by Rush Limbaugh and other leading conservatives. Morris speculates that the Obama HHS mandate on contraception, sterilization, and abortifacients is a fight with the Catholic Church that Team Obama wants -- and with the focus based narrowly on contraception, not abortifacients. Dick Morris may be right. It seems no accident that Obama publicly noted that the vast majority of Catholic women use contraception. Yes, the vast majority does, but the vast majority does not support abortifacients -- that is, "contraceptive" drugs that cause or induce...

A fascinating theory has been advanced by Dick Morris, which, in turn, is being considered by Rush Limbaugh and other leading conservatives. Morris speculates that the Obama HHS mandate on contraception, sterilization, and abortifacients is a fight with the Catholic Church that Team Obama wants -- and with the focus based narrowly on contraception, not abortifacients. Dick Morris may be right. It seems no accident that Obama publicly noted that the vast majority of Catholic women use contraception. Yes, the vast majority does, but the vast majority does not support abortifacients -- that is, "contraceptive" drugs that cause or induce...

With a majority of Americans rallying against the Obama Administration's rule that religious institutions must be forced to provide contraception, it appears that the sentiment is growing. The ObamaCare mandate mainly affects the Catholic Church, but many non-Catholics are making clear their opposition to this government intrusion. It's even spread to Democrats. One Democrat in particular, Senator Joe Manchin, has been unequivocal in his condemnation. Manhcin is up for re-election this year after serving two terms as West Virginia's Governor. "This is not only unacceptable, it is un-American," says Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., a Catholic who faces re-election in November...

They've got nobody to blame for it but themselves. President Barack Obama, with one swift contraception regulation, accomplished something his rivals have struggled to do: unify the Republican Party and fire up its base. “You never look for a fight, but you never walk away from a fight, and we will embrace this one a thousand percent,” said Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), a former head of the New Jersey chapter of Right to Life. On the other end of the Republican spectrum, Connecticut Senate candidate Chris Shays, a supporter of abortion rights, agreed with Smith and called on Health and...

Constitution: The Air Force removes a reference to God from its logo as the Army forbids Catholic chaplains from reading an archbishop's letter to those in uniform. What's next, the crosses at Arlington National Cemetery? 'It is a blow to a freedom that you have fought to defend and for which you have seen your buddies fall in battle," read the letter from Archbishop Timothy Broglio, who leads the Roman Catholic Archdiocese for the Military Services to the Catholic chaplains in the U.S. military. The letter that the Army's Office of the Chief of Chaplains kept from being read to...

When we were colonists and fought a war against the king and Parliament so that we could secede from the British Empire and be independent of it, we also fought for the value of personal freedom. That is the idea that in matters of personal choice, the government should play no role. The king only cared about the colonists' personal choices if he could control or tax them. One of the taxes he imposed was to support the Church of England. The Church of England that the colonists' tax dollars supported was, of course, in England; it was not here....

Faust is the main character in a German legend of a smart, important man in the local village that is bored with his life. He decides to call up the devil and make a bargain. In exchange for even more knowledge and power he agrees to sell his soul. This fairy tale like so many others ends happily as Faust is forgiven in the end. This story has been repeated many times from “The Devil and Daniel Webster” to “The Devil went down to Georgia” but it seems the lessons haven’t.

But ... what about the big climbdown? Ah well. Maybe he took a second look at what Planned Parenthood did to Komen and thought better of it. Even the man who leads the greatest army in the world needs to know when he's outgunned.Besides, how many divisions does the Pope have? President Obama “reinforced” his stance on the controversial contraception mandate while speaking at the Democrats’ annual retreat at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C. today, Senate Democrats said.The retreat was closed to media.Following President Obama’s speech at the retreat, a small group of Senate Democrats, mostly women, left the retreat...

Journalism: When the abortion giant's funding was in jeopardy, the media provided 24/7 coverage with a decidedly liberal slant. When the feds assaulted First Amendment religious freedom, you could hear the crickets chirp. Secular progressive bias in the media was never more evident than in the past few weeks with the difference in coverage of two major news stories — the temporary cutoff of funds from the Susan G. Komen Foundation to Planned Parenthood and the ultimatum from the Obama administration that the Catholic Church and its institutions had a year to find a way to violate their consciences and...

There is a DUFU edition in the very near future that I am going to have an absolute BLAST writing. It is when Obama is forced to REVERSE his decision to force Catholic hospitals and other institutions to provide contraceptive services via ObamaCare. Perhaps this regime thought they were being "reasonable" when they gave these institutions an extra year to fall into lockstep with their mandate. I am sure they never expected this MASSIVE reaction against this by the Catholics. Right now I'm positive the Bamster is cursing out his advisors (Axelrod? Sibelius? Jarret?) for putting him in a...

In the last couple of weeks, the President Barack Hussein Obama White House, like hitting a bald face hornets nest during the daytime when it ought to know better, “declared war” on not only the Roman Catholic bishops in the United States, but also the Roman Catholic Church in the United States of America.

The American Civil Liberties Union announced recently that it was suing the Obama administration to release records of the military’s “drone strikes in Yemen that killed terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki and other Americans.” I had to read the article twice to make sure I got it right -- I did. The “Americans” the United States was hunting down had renounced their U.S. citizenship long before in the most direct, absolute and unequivocal manner imaginable -- by becoming traitors to their country and openly and joyously reveling in their betrayal. The fact that the ACLU took up this cause didn’t surprise me....

The emerging conflict between the Catholic Church and the Obama administration may have a new front: in the U.S. military itself. The Catholic Church is fighting mad about an HHS ruling that would have them buy insurance for things they consider sinful–contraception, sterilization and abortion. All the bishops in the country sent out a letter to be read in their parishes promising that the Church "cannot-and will not-comply with this unjust law." Even Archbishop Timothy Broglio, who is in charge of Catholic military chaplains sent out the same letter. But after he did, the Army's Office of the Chief of...

Newt: Obama's war on the Catholic church On NBC's 'Meet The Press.' Liberal Rachel Maddow "diasgrees..." David Brooks of the NYTimes, highligted it (that it's going to be an issue), saying though its not being talked much in the media...

1st Amendment: Catholic bishops on Sunday issued a response to ObamaCare's mandates on providing contraception in violation of conscience and religious freedom. The message was simple: We will not comply. It was hardly a profile in courage when the Obama administration, hoping to kick the issue down the road past the November election, announced last Friday that Catholic hospitals and other religious institutions will have an extra year to comply with a new requirement that most health plans provide contraceptive benefits at no cost to their members. On Sunday, America's Catholic bishops in an open letter to their parishioners and...

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.

At the end of Sunday mass at the church this writer attends in Washington, D.C., the pastor asked the congregation to remain for a few minutes. Then, on the instructions of Cardinal Archbishop Donald Wuerl, the pastor proceeded to read a letter. In the letter, the Church denounced the Obama administration for ordering all Catholic schools, hospitals and social services to provide, in their health insurance coverage for employes, free contraceptives, free sterilizations and free "morning-after" pills. Parishioners were urged to contact their representatives in Congress to bring about a reversal of President Obama's new policy. Now, not only is...

.. it is to the Catholic Church more than to any other institution that we owe so many of the treasures of Western civilization. .., scholars operated for two centuries under an Enlightenment prejudice that assumes all progress to come from religious skeptics, and that whatever the church touches is backward, superstitious, even barbaric.</p><p> Since the mid-20th century, this unscholarly prejudice has thankfully begun to melt away, and professors of a variety of religious backgrounds, or none at all, increasingly acknowledge the church's contributions.</p><p> ... modern historians of science freely acknowledge the church's contributions - both theoretical and material -...

As the new government of Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti is facing a debt of $2.5 trillion, the country’s center-left parties are asking the Catholic Church to start paying taxes on its bountiful properties that make profit. The church may oblige, sacrificing more than $1 billion annually. “The Church is willing to review the agreements that extend to the paying of ICI (municipal property tax) on properties belonging to religious institutions,” U.K.’s Daily Mail quoted Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, leader of the Italian Bishops Conference, as saying. As per a 1982 law, all church properties, including those having a commercial element,...

ROME (AP) — Italy's Catholic Church has shifted gears and shown a willingness to revisit its tax-exempt status amid renewed criticism that much of its vast real estate holdings isn't subject to local property taxes. The criticism has grown recently following Premier Mario Monti's proposal to restore a property tax on first and second homes as part of his sweeping austerity measures to help reign in Italy's massive debt. With ordinary Italians being asked to make sacrifices, the church is coming under fire to do its part and give up what some consider an unfair privilege. Critics, most prominently Italy's...

The Shared Realm: Sandusky-Joe Paterno-Penn State, the Catholic Church, and H.R. 1681 "Every Child Deserves a Family Act" by John Roco 11/16/2011 7:40 p.m. Hawaii Standard Time The most unqualified failure in American culture is failure to recognize impending disaster. Examples such as, the housing crisis that lead to the economic downturn, or even 9/11 with warnings of terrorists learning to fly jet liners, figure in to our national persona, our Achilles heal. The culture of the Catholic church in a prior day and age is so similar to what happened at Penn State, that Bishop Dolan, president of the...

During a September 2002 meeting with NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts Willard Romney made this implied promise, “You need someone like me in Washington.” Both Willard and the baby killing ghouls of NARAL knew what was being discussed. He was running for Governor of Massachusetts and clearly looking past his anticipated victory to a day when he could stop pretending he cared about pro-life issues and show his true devotion to their “cause” from the White House. Romney made it quite clear that NARAL would have a friend in the State House and eventually in the White House if they helped elect...

Chapman University has increased its offer to purchase the 40-acre Crystal Cathedral property by $1.5 million, taking the total offer to $51.5 million. The university also has the blessing of the church's creditors committee, which in court documents filed Monday named Chapman as the preferred buyer. In addition, the university was selected over the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange by the cathedral's board, despite the diocese's higher offer of $53.6 million. The Chapman offer includes a 15-year leaseback and buyback option that would allow the cathedral to continue its ministry and iconic "Hour of Power" broadcasts, which have a worldwide...

With the violence surrounding the drug cartels reaching explosive levels within the last several years in Mexico, the Mexican Catholic Church has been outspoken in its criticism of the violence and the drug trade, but the Catholic Church has found itself in an awkward position of having accepted funds from suspected drug cartel leaders. By Zachary Deibel In the 1970s, grassroots movements seeking to instill principles of social justice, freedom for the oppressed, and equity under law through dogma and spirituality spread among Catholic priests, bishops, and laity throughout Latin America. While corrupt governments subjugated their meanest citizens, Gustavo Gutiérrez...

By demanding that the worst excesses of global capitalism be reined in, the Holy See echoed the message of protesters encamped outside St Paul's Cathedral in London, the indignados of Spain and the Occupy Wall Street movement in the US. In a forthright statement, the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace called for an end to rampant speculation, the redistribution of wealth, greater ethics and the establishment of a "central world bank" to which national banks would have to cede power. Such an authority would have "universal jurisdiction" over governments' economic strategies. Existing financial situations such as the World...

PARIS, France, October 21, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A group of Parisian Catholic students was beaten by riot police during a protest in front of a theater during the premiere of a blasphemous play by Italian playwright Romeo Castellicci, on Thursday evening. On the Concept of the Face of the Son of God is a scatological representation of an old man wracked with diarrhea whose son wipes and cleans him repeatedly on stage under a large reproduction of a Face of Christ by Antonello da Messina. Brown feces fill the stage - synthetic odor included -, the two actors leave the...

In 1941 a young priest was condemned to death by the Soviets. He was to become one of the ChurchÂ’s great leaders, says Jonathan LuxmooreIn a stately marble corridor of the Polish bishopsÂ’ conference HQ a diminutive old man stands awkwardly among colleagues in the regalia of episcopal office. Outside, a line of dark Mercedes wait to transport their passengers back to spacious residences, while in the vestibule teams of assistants stand in readiness. Cardinal Kazimierz ÅšwiÄ…tek, who died in July, was an unlikely ecclesiastical elder statesman, surviving imprisonment and exile before being called to lead his countryÂ’s Catholics through...

SANDY — Immigration remains a hot topic, as both the Most Rev. John C. Wester, Bishop of Salt Lake City, and Michael O’Shea, president of the Diocesan Council of Catholic Women, said at the beginning of a two-hour presentation at Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church on Oct. 1. When O’Shea asked Bishop Wester to speak, she told him, "You may not change any minds, but we need good information so we can make better decisions," she said, adding that she hoped those who attended would emerge knowing that "there is so much more we need to do to make people feel...

Michael Voris takes it to Obama in his latest Vortex. As a Catholic, I love this guy. He pulls no punches.

Galileo was facing some stiff odds when he published his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief Systems of the World. He'd already been officially warned against heliocentrism, and he had enemies. But it's possible, just possible, that he would have squeaked by if he hadn't been a jerk to the Pope. The feud between Galileo and the Catholic Church - the one that resulted in Galileo spending the last years of his life under house arrest - is perhaps the most well-known part of his history. Galileo was tried, threatened with torture, and forced to recant his perfectly correct position about...

How the Catholic Church Built Western CivilizationTHOMAS E. WOODS, JR.From the role of the monks to art and architecture, from the university to Western law, from science to charitable work, from international law to economics, How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization delves into just how indebted we are as a civilization to the Catholic Church, whether we realize it or not. By far the book’s longest chapter is "The Church and Science." We have all heard a great deal about the Church’s alleged hostility toward science. What most people fail to realize is that historians of science have...

Readings:• Isa 22:19-23• Ps 138:1-2, 2-3, 6, 8• Rom 11:33-36• Mt 16:13-20“The doctrine of the primacy of Peter is just one more of the many errors that the Church of Rome has added to the Christian religion.”So wrote the Presbyterian theologian Loraine Boettner in his 1962 book, Roman Catholicism, a popular work of anti-Catholic polemics. Although the religious landscape has changed significantly since the early 1960s, there are still many non-Catholic Christians today who agree wholeheartedly with Boettner’s assertions. The Papacy is unbiblical! It has no basis in Scripture! Peter was never singled out as a leader of the apostles!...

WICHITA, Kansas -- He came to fame as a passionate political activist. For years, Father Roy Bourgeois has tried to shut down the School of the Americas in Columbus, Georgia. He and his thousands of supporters claim it trains Latin American soldiers to defend American backed governments. But in more recent years, Bourgeois has taken on a new target, the Vatican. "Sexism is racism," said Bourgeois on a visit to the Wichita area this week. He is a staunch supporter to have women ordained as Catholic priests. "God created men and women of equal worth and dignity," said Bourgeois. "There's...

There are times when the church makes you feel proud. Priests' response to 9/11, ten years ago, is one of them.This became evident as the U.S. Bishops' Office of Media Relations interviewed and sought reflections from a few persons for "The Catholic Church Remembers," a website memorial of video clips, photos and print that can be found can be found here.Cardinal Edward Egan, retired archbishop of New York, was one of the first responders that fateful morning. He headed for Ground Zero when he heard of the attack. As he was on the way Mayor Rudolph Giuliani called and asked...

BERLIN (AP) -- The number of people leaving the Roman Catholic Church in Germany jumped by nearly 50 percent in 2010 as an abuse scandal widened, new data showed Friday. Some 181,000 people quit their memberships last year, up from 124,000 in 2009, official numbers released by Germany's Roman Catholic Church showed. Deaths and people turning away from the church heavily outnumbered baptisms, which reached a record low, putting one of the world's wealthiest and most influential Catholic Churches further in decline. Over the past twenty years, the number of members of Germany's Roman Catholic Church has fallen from 28.3...

John C. Favalora is a sallow old man who looks like the corpse of Dom DeLuise. He likes attractive young men to sit on his lap and allegedly treats them to trips in the Florida Keys. He was, until recently, part owner of a company that makes "all natural" boner-inducing beverages. He's also the Archbishop Emeritus of Miami. Favalora, who was the most powerful Catholic official in Southern Florida from 1994 until last year, stands accused of cultivating what one group of pissed-off Catholics describes as a corrupt "homosexual superculture" in the 195 churches, schools, missions, seminaries, and universities that...

Santo Domingo. - Cardinal Nicolas de Jesus Lopez Rodriguez Thursday railed the U.S Ambassador’s criticism of the state of Law in the Dominican Republic, affirming that Washington lacks moral authority to do so. Responding to Raul Izaguirre’s statements in the American Chamber of Commerce event Wednesday, the prelate noted that although he acknowledges that many aspects have to be shored up, the diplomat’s country also has many things to correct. He said one must have the morals to advise others, especially if the advisor comes from a country which, although democratic, has many things that don’t function well. Lopez Rodriguez...

Featured Term (selected at random):POWER OF JURISDICTION The moral right to govern the faithful in the Catholic Church. Also called the power of ruling (potestas regiminis), which, by divine institution, belongs to the Church founded by Christ. It includes jurisdiction in the external forum (publicly known) and the internal forum (privately matters of conscience), whether sacramental or nonsacramental. All items in this dictionary are from Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.

The Vatican is upset, and feeling like a victim. The Vatican is angry that the world is no longer willing to tolerate the alleged homophobia of the Catholic Church. However, not everybody is sympathetic to the Vatican's claim of victimization. Tuesday the Vatican condemned a United Nations Human Rights Council resolution in support of gay rights. The resolution was sponsored by 85 countries including the United States. The Vatican objects to this resolution that simply and clearly states that human rights apply to everyone, no matter who they are or whom they love. By Thursday, the Vatican's statement was being...

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced Tuesday that it had suspended 21 priests from active ministry in connection with accusations that involved sexual abuse or otherwise inappropriate behavior with minors. The mass suspension was the single-most sweeping in the history of the sexual-abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, said Terence McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org, which archives documents from the abuse scandal in dioceses across the country. The archdiocese’s action follows a damning grand jury report issued Feb. 10 that accused the archdiocese of a widespread cover-up of predatory priests, stretching over decades, and said that as...

One recent Sunday, the pastor of my church -- a priest who I love and who my wife and I requested to marry us -- gave a homily on the relationship between "justice" and "charity." Sadly, this sermon supplied none of the inspiration of which his other sermons were ridden. This, though, isn't to say that it wasn't provocative; unfortunately, however, what it provoked-or what it provoked in me-was a melancholic effect. My pastor's homily was but the latest confirmation of that what many an astute observer has long observed: the "progressivism" of secular leftism has made sizable inroads into...

A rather unexpected voice just joined the chorus of the liberal media outcry over sex scandals among some Catholic clergymen: none other than Evo Morales, Bolivia’s socialist and neopagan president. A Neopagan Socialist... Indeed, Mr. Morales, leader of the Movement to Socialism, figured he should teach the Pope how things in the Church ought to be run. For those who may not know, he was inaugurated President of Bolivia in 2006 using indigenous pagan rituals.1 The Bolivian newspaper Los Tiempos, of Cochabamba (6/20/2006), described the ceremony: “Evo Morales assumed political power with a spectacular display of religious rituals alluding to...

slamopologists at the New York Times clearly love to promote the false notion that Islam is exactly like Christianity, at least when they are boiled down to their basics. Often, the Catholic Church specifically is compared to Islam as if they are basically one and the same. As we saw in Rachel Donadio’s article on the Cathedral of Córdoba, which she referred to (wrongly) as “The Great Mosque,” Islam is preferred to Catholicism even to the point of blatant lying. Now, we find the New York Times comparing even the Muslim Brotherhood, specifically, to Catholicism in an article that appears...

Fresh off of his election victory, President-elect Barack Obama is already facing a fight from another opponent – the Catholic Church – on the issue of abortion. "Anytime someone like him, someone with his position [on abortion] is elected to a major office, it increases the difficulty for us," Ed Mechmann, of the NY Archdiocese, said. Mechmann says that at their annual meeting this week, the nation's Catholic bishops are discussing how to tackle Obama's support of the Freedom of Choice Act. That act, which currently stands before Congress, seeks to overturn the 2003 legislation signed by President Bush that...

CARACAS, Venezuela -- Roman Catholic leaders in Venezuela are calling for President Hugo Chavez to give up special lawmaking powers granted to him by his congressional allies. The Venezuelan Bishops' Conference condemned a package of laws approved last month by the National Assembly, including one that grants Chavez power to enact laws by decree for the next 18 months. Chavez gained those powers shortly before a new congress took office with more opposition lawmakers. A statement from the bishops released Tuesday accuses Chavez of trying to impose a totalitarian system in Venezuela.

A jury in Delaware on Wednesday awarded $30 million in compensatory damages to a man who said he was sexually abused more than 100 times by a Roman Catholic priest — the largest such award granted to a single victim in a clergy abuse case, victims’ advocates said. Related In an unusual outcome, the jury decided that the parish where the abuse occurred, St. Elizabeth in Wilmington, must pay $3 million of the damages, while the perpetrator is liable for the rest. Parishes have previously been held liable in only one or two cases involving abuse by Catholic priests, according...

Prompted by a billboard calling Christmas a myth, the Catholic League erected a pro-Jesus billboard Tuesday. MANHATTAN — The Catholic League, upset over an anti-Christmas billboard at the New Jersey entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel, threw a "counterpunch" at atheists Tuesday with a billboard of their own on the New York side of the tunnel.The new 26-by-24-foot billboard at Dyer Avenue and West 31st Street features a depiction of Joseph and Mary looking adoringly at baby Jesus, with the message: "You know it's real. This season, celebrate Jesus. Merry Christmas from the Catholic League," according to the Catholic League's website....

The Roman Catholic Church is looking for a few good men -- to battle Satan. The church in the US has become so short of priests who know how to perform an exorcism that it began an emergency two-day meeting yesterday to teach clerics how to properly cast out demons. A group of 56 bishops and 66 priests -- including an assistant to New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan -- have gathered in Baltimore for the Conference on the Liturgical and Pastoral Practice of Exorcism. The mystical meeting was focused on a lot more than just dodging green vomit and stopping...