{"id":36,"date":"2012-05-24T18:23:00","date_gmt":"2012-05-25T00:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/egregioustwaddle\/2012\/05\/consider-the-source\/"},"modified":"2016-05-02T11:32:07","modified_gmt":"2016-05-02T17:32:07","slug":"consider-the-source","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/egregioustwaddle\/2012\/05\/consider-the-source.html","title":{"rendered":"Consider the Source"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
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As we continue the skirmish known variously as The Battle for Religious Freedom and The War on Women, I continue to be fascinated by the underlying assumptions and agendas behind the contested portion of the HHS mandate. To repeat what often gets lost, Catholic leaders are not taking issue with the President\u2019s health care plan\u2013indeed, Catholics were strongly in favor of broadening access to healthcare\u2013or even with many of the other women\u2019s health initiatives among which the disputed regulation is included. We\u2019re all for equalizing access to screening for diabetes and heart disease, among a number of other areas in which coverage for women\u2019s health care lagged behind that for men. The piece that we object to, on grounds that have been well spelled out in recent lawsuits, is the mandate that requires employers to provide a full range of contraceptive services (including those the Church, which teaches that life begins at conception and not at implantation, defines as abortifacients) and sterilization at no cost to their female employees as part of covered preventive care.<\/p>\n

The administration believes it has made a compelling case for overriding conscience concerns. This case draws on recommendations made by the National Institute of Medicine in a July 2011 white paper<\/a><\/b>. This outlines in detail the \u201cpublic health emergency\u201d upon which the case for the mandate has been made, but here is a quick summary, as objectively worded as I can manage:<\/p>\n