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Bishops Urge Action On Mandate “[D]espite widespread opposition to this coercive policy by religious organizations, lawmakers and the general public, Congress has still taken no action to counter it,” Cardinal DiNardo wrote. “The time for such action is, to say the least, overdue.” He mentioned recent legislative attempts in Congress to take “corrective” action on the mandate, including an attempt in the House to attach a measure to the Labor/HHS appropriations bill for Fiscal Year 2013. However, DiNardo explains that “it now seems this legislation will not be considered until next March, months after the mandate has been imposed on most employers.” “Through this mandate, the Administration is promoting an approach to religious freedom that is more grudging and arbitrary than any yet seen in federal law,” DiNardo writes in the letter. He warns of the negative impact of the mandate on a “third group of employees,” specifically “devout individuals and families who own and operate businesses, who without any word of protest from employees have been offering health coverage that does not violate their moral convictions.” According to the DiNardo, “their longtime practice will be contrary to federal law, punished by a tax of $100 a day per employee and other penalties.” He goes on to point out that, “Four of the pending law suits against the contraceptive mandate represent Catholic business owners of this kind in Colorado, Pennsylvania, Missouri and Michigan.” In related news, at least one Catholic group has publicly announced its intentions to defy the government’s contraceptive mandate, in addition to filing a federal lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services over the requirements. On August 1, Father Frank Pavone of Priests for Life, a pro-life Catholic group, told LifeNews.com that his organization, which he says does not qualify for the narrow exemption in the mandate, will not comply with the requirement to provide contraception coverage to its employees. In an August 1 memo to Priests for Life employees and consultants, Father Pavone wrote that, “In order to avoid the slightest semblance of scandal, or compromise of our principles, and lest any employee should imagine that we would ever consent to provide coverage for actions that destroy human life, I want to make it clear to you today that we will disobey this mandate.” Father Pavone continued in the memo, “Neither Priests for Life as an organization, nor any one of our administrative team or Board of Directors, nor I personally, consent to provide, pay for, advocate, counsel, refer, or in any way tolerate or cooperate with any process, plan, exchange of money or services, or any other activity that would enable a person to engage in the use of abortion-inducing drugs, contraception, or sterilization.” He urged Priests for Life employees to “stand together in resisting” the mandate, and expressed his hope that the organization’s lawsuit, Priests for Life v. Sebelius, will prevail in the courts. Related resources: Copyright © 2012. North Carolina Family Policy Council. All rights reserved.
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