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January 20, 2012
The Deeply Misguided Contraception-Mandate Decision
The decision not to expand the narrow exemption from mandatory contraceptive coverage is disappointing, for me, on several levels. As someone who believes that the healthcare law accomplishes many good goals, I think it is both unjust and strategically unwise for progressives to reject meaningful exemptions from such laws. Among other things, the statute is now one step more vulnerable to being undercut or even repealed at the initiative of those angered or burdened by it.
Here's my recent piece from The Christian Century arguing that religious progressives "should support significant accommodations for religious beliefs--even those with which they disagree."
Posted by Thomas Berg on January 20, 2012 at 08:04 PM in Berg, Thomas | Permalink
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It must be repealed. We must resist this even if it means persecution. Those Catholics involved in this should be sanctioned according to canon law.
Posted by: Fr. J | Jan 22, 2012 2:40:26 PM
"... religious progressives "should support significant accommodations for religious beliefs--even those with which they disagree."
And do you see any likelihood that religious conservatives would support significant accomodations for beliefs that they disagree with?
Obviously a negative answer would not mean that you were wrong, sometimes we are morally obligated to tolerate those who would not tolerate us. But if the answer is no, your argument loses a lot of practical force, I would think.
Posted by: william brennan | Jan 22, 2012 3:14:48 PM
I can think of lots of examples. Many religious conservative groups lined up to support the right of a syncretic sect to consume hallucinogenic tea in the UDV case, over the objection of some members who thought the ritual was dangerous and abhorrent. Many supported the right of the Santeria to sacrifice animals and the Native American groups to consume peyote, despite the same objections. Many supported the RLUIPA statute that gives Jewish and Muslim prisoners the right, among other things, to receive special diets despite the public expense.
On Muslim issues, the record of conservatives is very mixed. But there are many conservatives like Robbie George arguing for reasonable accommodation rather than Ground-Zero-mosque-type intolerance. Shouldn't we encourage the former attitude among conservatives rather than the latter? Same for progressives, I think--especially since a presumptive commitment to freedom from government impositions on conscience is a historic hallmark of liberalism.
Posted by: Tom Berg | Jan 22, 2012 4:21:14 PM
Can Catholicism be free enough of demands, or can the American government permit enough exemptions, so that American Catholics can reasonably expect to say they should never have to opt out?
Posted by: David Nickol | Jan 22, 2012 6:40:16 PM
Can "We the People" show the quality that the Justices who authored and signed onto Employment Division v. Smith believed was so worthy of its trust -- that is, the capacity of the majority to tolerate and accommodate difference from the conventions that bind together the altogether conventional people of our day?
I have never trusted people, and least of all "the People." This is largely the reason I find the Smith decision so misguided. But I am neither as wise nor remotely as important as the signatories to it.
Posted by: Marc DeGirolami | Jan 22, 2012 10:02:23 PM
"Same for progressives, I think--especially since a presumptive commitment to freedom from government impositions on conscience is a historic hallmark of liberalism."
Alas, I think that commitment is "historic" only in the sense of "used to exist in history, but is long gone." I stopped being "progressive" long ago, but continue to be dismayed by the intolerance of my progressive friends. The wrong speech, the wrong religious beliefs, the wrong thoughts -- all must be stamped out!
Posted by: sadder every day | Jan 23, 2012 2:22:21 PM
Archbishop Chaput: "Evil talks about tolerance only when it’s weak. When it gains the upper hand, its vanity always requires the destruction of the good and the innocent, because the example of good and innocent lives is an ongoing witness against it. So it always has been. So it always will be. And America has no special immunity to becoming an enemy of its own founding beliefs about human freedom, human dignity, the limited power of the state, and the sovereignty of God."
Posted by: Fr. J | Jan 24, 2012 1:56:33 PM
