Bishops Issue Call To Action To Defend Religious Liberty: Urge strong lay involvement

Outline threats to First Freedom at all levels of government and abroad

Call upon dioceses to pursue religious liberty fortnight, June 21-July 4

NEWS RELEASE

WASHINGTON—The U.S. bishops have issued a call to action to defend religious liberty and urged laity to work to protect the First Freedom of the Bill of Rights. They outlined their position in “Our First, Most Cherished Liberty.” The document was developed by the Ad Hoc Committee on Religious Liberty of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), approved for publication by the USCCB Administrative Committee March 13, and published in English and Spanish April 12.

“We have been staunch defenders of religious liberty in the past. We have a solemn duty to discharge that duty today,” the bishops said in the document, “… for religious liberty is under attack, both at home and abroad.”

The document lists concerns that prompt the bishops to act now. Among concerns are:

• The Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate forcing all employers, including religious organizations, to provide and pay for coverage of employees’ contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs even when they have moral objections to them. Another concern is HHS’s defining which religious institutions are“religious enough” to merit protection of their religious liberty.

• Driving Catholic foster care and adoption services out of business. Boston, San Francisco, the District of Columbia and Illinois have driven local Catholic Charities adoption or foster care services out of business by revoking their licenses, by ending their government contracts, or both—because those Charities refused to place children with same-sex couples or unmarried opposite-sex couples who cohabit.

• Discrimination against Catholic humanitarian services. Despite years of excellent performance by the USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services in administering contract services for victims of human trafficking, the federal government changed its contract specifications to require USCCB to provide or refer for contraceptive and abortion services in violation of Catholic teaching. Religious institutions should not be disqualified from a government contract based on religious belief, and they do not lose their religious identity or liberty upon entering such contracts. Recently, a federal court judge in Massachusetts turned religious liberty on its head when he declared that such a disqualification is required by the First Amendment—that the government violates religious liberty by allowing Catholic organizations to participate in contracts in a manner consistent with their beliefs on contraception and abortion.

The statement lists other examples such as laws punishing charity to undocumented immigrants; a proposal to restructure Catholic parish corporations to limit the bishop’s role; and a state university’s excluding a religious student group because it limits leadership positions to those who share the group’s religion.

Other topics include the history and deep resonance of Catholic and American visions of religious freedom, the recent tactic of reducing freedom of religion to freedom of worship, the distinction between conscientious objection to a just law, and civil disobedience of an unjust law, the primacy of religious freedom among civil liberties, the need for active vigilance in protecting that freedom, and concern for religious liberty among interfaith and ecumenical groups and across partisan lines.

The bishops decry limiting religious freedom to the sanctuary.

“Religious liberty is not only about our ability to go to Mass on Sunday or pray the Rosary at home. It is about whether we can make our contribution to the common good of all Americans,” they said. “Can we do the good works our faith calls us to do, without having to compromise that very same faith?”

“This is not a Catholic issue. This is not a Jewish issue. This is not an Orthodox, Mormon, or Muslim issue. It is an American issue,” they said.

The bishops highlighted religious freedom abroad.

“Our obligation at home is to defend religious liberty robustly, but we cannot overlook the much graver plight that religious believers, most of them Christian, face around the world,” they said.“The age of martyrdom has not passed. Assassinations, bombings of churches, torching of orphanages—these are only the most violent attacks Christians have suffered because of their faith in Jesus Christ. More systematic denials of basic human rights are found in the laws of several countries, and also in acts of persecution by adherents of other faiths.”

The document ends with a call to action.

“What we ask is nothing more than that our God-given right to religious liberty be respected. We ask nothing less than that the Constitution and laws of the United States, which recognize that right, be respected.” They specifically addressed several groups: the laity, those in public office, heads of Catholic charitable agencies, priests, experts in communication, and urged each to employ the gifts and talents of its members for religious liberty.

The bishops called for “A Fortnight for Freedom,” the two-week period from June 21 to July 4—beginning with the feasts of St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher and ending with Independence Day—to focus “all the energies the Catholic community can muster” for religious liberty. They also asked that, later in the year, the feast of Christ the King be “a day specifically employed by bishops and priests to preach about religious liberty, both here and abroad.”

Members of the Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty include

Archbishop-designate William E. Lori of Baltimore, chairman
Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington
Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, OFM Cap, of Philadelphia
Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory of Atlanta
Archbishop John C. Nienstedt of St. Paul–Minneapolis
Archbishop Thomas J. Rodi, of Mobile, Alabama
Archbishop J. Peter Sartain of Seattle
Bishop John O. Barres of Allentown, Pennsylvania
Bishop Daniel E. Flores of Brownsville, Texas
Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted of Phoenix
Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois

Consultants include

Archbishop José H. Gomez of Los Angeles
Bishop Stephen E. Blaire of Stockton. California
Bishop Joseph P. McFadden of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Bishop Richard E. Pates of Des Moines, Iowa
Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades of Fort Wayne–South Bend, Indiana

Media contact only:

Sr. Mary Ann Walsh Office: 202-541-3200 Mobile : 301-325-7935 Email

In the True North Strong and Free

Project Letter to the Calgary Herald

Sean Murphy*

Twelve years ago, an editorial in the Calgary Herald1 expressed hope that a bill proposed by MLA Julius Yankowsky2 would ensure that health care professionals would not be forced to participate in procedures or services to which they objected for reasons of conscience.

The editorial cited the example of coerced participation of nurses in late term abortions at Foothills Hospital3 and the case of Maria Bizecki, a pharmacist facing discipline for refusing to dispense the morning after pill.4 The bill, said the editorial, was “a common sense compromise” that would respect freedom of conscience without preventing access to abortion or drugs. Yankowsky’s bill did not pass, but a common sense compromise was eventually worked out between Ms. Bizecki and her employer, the Calgary Cooperative Association.5

While Ms. Bizecki’s case was grinding slowly forward, she and Professor Donald De Marco met the Herald editorial board. Danielle Smith, then a member of the board, was at the meeting. So was Herald columnist Naomi Lakritz, who, at one point, personally congratulated Ms. Bizecki for her stand.6

Danielle Smith, now leader of the Wildrose Party, appears to be advocating the kind of compromise supported by the Herald when it expressed support for freedom of conscience for health care professionals. Ms. Lakritz, however, seems to have changed her mind.

“The word ‘conscience,’” she writes, “is now being used to advocate doing the wrong thing” – like refusing to dispense the morning after pill. (“Conscience rights is another way of allowing discrimination.”Calgary Herald, 10 April, 2012)

Ms. Lakritz is not alone in this belief. She reports that Alison Redford, the Premier of the province, is actually frightened by suggestions that at least some people in Alberta might refuse to do what they believe to be wrong. We are told that Liberal and NDP leaders also oppose freedom of conscience, and that the Alberta Party leader condemns protection of conscience legislation as “an exercise in exclusion,” a point apparently overlooked by those who drafted Section 2(a) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

According to Ms. Lakritz, the Premier believes that suppression of freedom of conscience demonstrates respect for diversity, that people are treated with “dignity and respect” when they are forced to do what they believe to be wrong, and that threatening conscientious objectors with dismissal makes people feel “safe and included.”

We are not told if the Premier and other leaders opposed to freedom of conscience insist that their candidates sacrifice their personal integrity in order to run for office. Nor does Ms. Lakritz tell us if employees at the Calgary Herald must do what they believe to be wrong as a condition of employment or promotion.

She does, however, claim that those who, for reasons of conscience, refuse to provide a legal drug or service act wrongly and dishonourably because they thus treat some people “as though they were much less equal to others.” This is like saying that refusing to sell tobacco is wrong because it treats smokers “as though they were much less equal” to non-smokers, or that refusing to facilitate prostitution is dishonourable because it denies equality to ‘sex trade workers.’ Even if one accepts such a peculiar notion of equality, however, equality is not the only principle relevant to the moral evaluation of an act. Moreover, the mere legality of a product or service imposes no duty to provide it or to affirm its moral acceptability. Ms. Lakritz made this clear when she excoriated Henry Morgentaler and abortion rights groups for suggesting that Catholic bishops should ask people to stop protesting abortions – a legal, tax-paid service.

“[The bishops] are not exactly known for indulging in moral relativism,” she observed.

“What this society needs is more people like them who take a firm stand on issues and do not apologize for refusing to be swayed by whatever current compromise passes for morality.”7

It is a pity that Ms. Lakritz no longer believes this: that she now holds that such people are “truly disgusting,” and that personal integrity and courage are grounds for dismissal in the true north strong and free.

O, Canada.

Notes

1. “Editorial, The Calgary Herald, April 11, 2000. (Accessed 2012-04-11)

2. Bill 212, Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Amendment Act, 2000.

3. Ko, Marnie, “Personal Qualms Don’t Count: Foothills Hospital Now Forces Nurses To Participate In Genetic Terminations.” Alberta Report Newsmagazine, April 12, 1999

4. Mastromatteo, Mike, “Alberta Pharmacist Vindicated for Pro-Life Stand.” The BC Catholic, 3 November, 2003

5. Gerald D. Chipeur to the Calgary Co-operative Association Re: Maria Bizecki, 19 December, 2001

6. E-mails from Maria Bizecki to the Administrator, Protection of Conscience Project, 10 and April, 2012.

7. Lakritz, Naomi, “Hypocrite Henry: Morgentaler exercises his own brand of violence.” Winnipeg Sun, 17 January, 1995 (Accessed 2012-04-13)

Prescribing drugs to secure religious conformity: question of conscience?

Haaretz reports that psychiatric drugs are being prescribed to members of the ultra-orthodox Jewish Haredi community to suppress sexual urges and help them to conform to religious prohibitions against masturbation, homosexual conduct and frequent sexual relations. A posting on the Practical Ethics blog of Oxford University asks whether or not psychiatrists may, for reasons of conscience, refuse to prescribe drugs for this reason. The writer, quoting Julian Salvulescu’s denunciation of freedom of conscience in health care, reasons “a psychiatrist has no ground for conscientious objection and should provide the treatment to Haredim,” but ultimately concludes that this seems “intuitively incorrect.”

Human eggs grown from stem cells to be used to produce embryos

It is reported that, within a few weeks, researchers from Edinburgh University will request a license from Britain’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) to fertilize human eggs produced from stem cells isolated in ovarian tissue. The ultimate goal is to produce an unlimited supply of human eggs for artificial reproduction and research, and, perhaps, to provide a way to treat older women to prevent health problems related to menopause. However, the immediate purpose is to demonstrate that the eggs grown in the laboratory can be used to produce human embryos. Embryos produced in the initial experiment will be studied for up to 14 days and then destroyed or frozen. [The Independent] While researchers clearly are protected by a protection of conscience provision in the Human Fertilization and Embryology Act, a recent court decision suggests that the law may not protect physicians and others who may be asked to facilitate procedures and services that may ultimately be derived from this research.

Freedom of conscience frightens Premier of Alberta

Progressive Conservative Premier Alison Redford of Alberta states that she is “very frightened” by support for freedom of conscience expressed by the leader of the Wildrose Party, her principal opponent in the current provincial election campaign. The Wildrose Party is officially committed to protection of conscience legislation for health care workers. Danielle Smith, party leader, recently stated that she would apply the same principle to marriage commissioners who object to performing marriage ceremonies for same-sex couples. Smith’s comments have drawn strident denunciations, equating the exercise of freedom of conscience with discrimination and hate-mongering. [Canadian Press] [Project letter to Calgary Herald]