In yet another slight to rule of law, the Obama Administration has asked a federal court to put a press conference pronouncement above official regulation. Last week, the Department of Justice filed a legal response to one of numerous lawsuits currently challenging the constitutionality of the Obamacare anti-conscience mandate. The Administration submitted its response to the legal complaint of Belmont Abbey College, represented by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, to the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia. In what the Becket Fund is calling a “remarkable” stance, …
Indonesians are proud of the respect for pluralism and tolerance embedded in their constitution. Indeed, Indonesia is largely tolerant of religious differences. Unfortunately, it is not yet fully governed by its constitution. Case in point: the continuing saga of GKI Yasmin church in Bogor, West Java. In the early 2000s, a Protestant congregation in Bogor purchased a plot of land in the Taman Yasmin housing complex to build a church. They obtained the signatures from local residents as mandated by law, and in 2006, Bogor Mayor Diani Budiarto issued a …
In Obamacare’s collision course with Americans’ freedom, one of the first casualties is religious liberty. Despite the Administration’s obfuscating press comments, the finalized preventive services mandate changed nothing from the interim rule. It put into law the requirement that many religious employers violate their deeply held beliefs by paying for abortion-inducing drugs, contraceptives, and sterilization. Many recognize the religious liberty violations in the mandate—and Obamacare’s broader threats to individual liberty—will not be rectified unless the health care law is repealed. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops explains that the President’s …
President Obama talked the talk but then blatantly refused to walk the walk on the freedom of religious institutions from the Obamacare statute’s mandate for group health insurance coverage of abortion-inducing drugs, contraceptives, and sterilization. The Obama Administration continues to trample on religious liberty by issuing rules that require many religious hospitals, charities, and schools to abandon the tenets of their faiths and comply with that mandate. Many voices came together in objection to the interim final regulations of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Treasury …
Today, President Obama unsuccessfully attempted to extricate himself from a political crisis of his own making. The issue is Obamacare’s requirement that health insurers and employer-sponsored health plans cover federally mandated “preventive services” in their benefit packages—with no co-pays for enrollees—and the Administration’s subsequent regulatory requirement that those mandated preventive services include contraceptive products and services—including abortion-inducing drugs. The “compromise” the President announced today is that contraception coverage “will be offered to women by their employers’ insurance companies directly, with no role for religious employers who oppose contraception. Insurance companies …
Seven years ago Erick Erickson took the reins at RedState to transform the conservative blog into one of the most influential sources of news on the right. He’s led online activists to challenge Republicans and conservatives, unafraid to go to battle on a range of issues. Today he hosts the Erick Erickson Show on WSB Radio in Atlanta and frequently appears on CNN as a political contributor. He was in Washington this week for CPAC and hosted his radio show from Heritage’s Robert H. Bruce Radio Studio. We spoke to …
The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty has already filed two lawsuits challenging the Obamacare regulation that requires many religious employers to provide health insurance coverage for sterilization, contraception, and what many people believe are abortion-inducing drugs. Those lawsuits are on behalf of Belmont Abbey College (a Benedictine Catholic college in North Carolina) and Colorado Christian University (a nondenominational Christian university in Colorado). This morning, the Becket Fund sued the Obama Administration again, this time on behalf of Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN), the Catholic television network that was started nearly …
On January 20, U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius finalized regulations for preventive services under Obamacare that require religious institutions beyond churches to provide and pay for contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs, and sterilization in their health coverage. The mandate violates the teachings and beliefs of many religious institutions and puts their ministries of service to millions at risk. It tramples religious liberty, and it has rightly offended many Americans. The quotations below from sources across the political spectrum are just a sampling of the outcry against the Obamacare …
It is a rare moment indeed when faith denominations of all stripes unite together in common cause, and it is rarer still when that cause is a political one, with a sole piece of legislation as its principal target. But when that law eviscerates the very foundation of religious liberty in America as protected under the First Amendment, it should not be surprising that Catholics and Jews, evangelical Christians, and mainline Lutherans alike find common cause in defense of their liberties. Such is the case with the firestorm of opposition …
The Obama Administration’s mandate under the Obamacare statute that many religious employers provide health care coverage for contraception, abortifacients, and human sterilization tramples upon their constitutionally guaranteed free exercise of religion. Secretary Kathleen Sebelius of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently announced the Administration policy. Many faiths have united in opposition to the Obama Administration attack on religious liberty. On January 20, 2012, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said that “To force American citizens to choose between violating their consciences and forgoing their healthcare is …
