This past weekend, the first after the Bishop's Lenten Appeal, some of what the appeal goes for was on display at the doors of the Church. Postcards to our members of Congress and the Senate were available with the following text:
The new Congress should come together to respect life and religious freedom. Please support and strengthen laws that (1) prevent federal funding of abortion, and (2) protect rights of conscience in health care. Government must not force Americans to violate their religious and moral beliefs on respect for life when they provide health care or sponsor or purchase health insurance. As your constituent, I would appreciate a written response telling me how you will vote on these matters.
Of course, there are so such votes scheduled for this year aside from normal procedural riders - and only DC's budget may have any debate - even though it should not as we are talking about local issues. Indeed, if they want the DC Medicaid issue to go away, the federal government should fully fund it. Indeed, doing so for all states would end state funding of abortion in many states where it is quite common. No bills are on the docket waiting to be debated, even in committee.
There is action at HHS, which mostly folded to the Church's demands on conscience protection - although the reality of the situation is that any policy purchased from an outside source has provided contraception coverage since December 2000, due to an order to the insurance companies by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. For the HHS to go against that order would be both complicated and illegal, since the Institute of Medicine has said this is necessary coverage. Indeed, because health insurance is federally subsidized through both tax benefits and direct subsidies (starting next year) allowing employers to deny health insurance for contraception would be the equivalent of overturning Griswold v. Connecticut, which no agency can think of doing on its own.
The real issue, however, is neither abortion or contraception. It is grass roots mobilization. There is a fourth card in the printed set which encourages people to send their information to the National Committee for the Human Life Amendment. It includes Name, E-Mail, State and Diocese Information. While NCHLA says they never sell their lists, it seems that the Susan B. Anthony Fund had quite the effective list after the FOCA mailing campain. That fund is why John Boehner is speaker, as they removed pro-life Democrats who voted for health care reform by lying about the question of whether it would cause abortion (it does not - especially when compared to current tax law).
Needless to say, our household will not be returning any of these cards.
No comments:
Post a Comment