Catholic Bishops Show Their True Colors:

Catholic Bishops have whole­sale reject­ed the com­pro­mise made by President Obama. 

Catholic Bishops in the United States have shown that their objec­tions to Administration pol­i­cy is pure­ly polit­i­cal . The pol­i­cy would have catholic busi­ness­es like Hospitals and Universities the church oper­ate pay for con­tra­cep­tive cov­er­age in their health plans. Catholic bish­ops argue the new pol­i­cy would force them do pro­vide fund­ing for some­thing they are moral­ly opposed to. The pres­i­dent has since stepped into the fray offer­ing a com­pro­mise which would have the Insurance com­pa­nies pick­ing up the tab for the con­tra­cep­tion to women employed by these catholic institutions.

As I indi­cat­ed yes­ter­day Timothy Dolan the des­ig­nat­ed leader of the catholic bish­ops, issued a rather pompous state­ment in response to the olive branch extend­ed by pres­i­dent Obama. Dolan issued a rather dis­re­spect­ful and scathing broad­side in which he cas­ti­gat­ed the admin­is­tra­tion, accus­ing it of inter­fer­ing with the oper­a­tions of the church.

It did not mat­ter to Dolan that the issue has noth­ing to do with Government inter­fer­ence in the church , but actu­al­ly is about wom­en’s repro­duc­tive rights and health. Dolan seemed not to want the truth to get in the way of the repub­li­can nar­ra­tive he want­ed to prolong.

The bish­ops said the plan offered insuf­fi­cient pro­tec­tion for their insti­tu­tions: “In the case where the employ­ee and insur­er agree to add the objec­tion­able cov­er­age, that cov­er­age is still pro­vid­ed as a part of the object­ing employer’s plan, financed in the same way as the rest of the cov­er­age offered by the object­ing employ­er. This, too, rais­es seri­ous moral con­cerns.” The Obama admin­is­tra­tion plans to hold a series of meet­ings in the com­ing days and will invite the bish­ops and oth­er reli­gious lead­ers to col­lab­o­rate on devel­op­ing the new pol­i­cy, said an admin­is­tra­tion offi­cial who was not autho­rized to speak on the record. 

James Salt, exec­u­tive direc­tor of Catholics United, a lib­er­al advo­ca­cy group that is orga­niz­ing sup­port for the Obama admin­is­tra­tion, said, “The bish­ops’ blan­ket oppo­si­tion appears to serve the inter­ests of a polit­i­cal agen­da, not the needs of the American peo­ple.” nework​times​.com 

Timothy Dolan

For the Catholic Church, which con­sid­ers the use of arti­fi­cial birth con­trol a sin, the man­date is “a rad­i­cal­ly new and unprece­dent­ed attack on reli­gious free­dom,” said Washington Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Baltimore Archbishop Edwin O’Brien and Wilmington Bishop W. Francis Malooly.(usato​day​.com)

The lan­guage of the bish­ops in the last para­graph is replete with the talk­ing points of repub­li­cans in con­gress, those on the cam­paign trail and the talk­ing heads on FOX mis-information.

This is not about any gov­ern­men­tal intru­sion into the affairs of the church, it is not about the exec­u­tive branch over-reach­ing into reli­gion, it is open assault on the duly elect­ed pres­i­dent of the United States of America by repub­li­can oper­a­tives with­in the catholic church on behalf of their friends on the far right of the repub­li­can party.

Let us be clear even some of those who first object­ed like for­mer Governor Tim Kaine has said that the com­pro­mise offered by the pres­i­dent sat­is­fied all con­cerns he had . Clearly the catholic church has aligned itself with repub­li­can right wingers in this coun­try against work­ing women. Women who make up large parts of the con­gre­ga­tion that makes the catholic church the pow­er­ful and filthy rich tax exempt insti­tu­tion it is .