In a recent comment on one of my posts below, good friend and excellent Catholic, Mr. Lovel Miguel said from Houston, Texas...
I recently renewed my health insurance coverage from my employer and found out big changes.
Effective January 2013, due to the Healthcare Reform (Obamacare), just to name one, oral contraceptives and devices are 100% covered. And I don't have a choice even if I want to opt out since you either get or drop the plan. You can't even get another plan from other private insurance companies since this is a MANDATE. Everybody has to have it in their plan. On top of that, I will be paying more!
Talking about religious liberty. This is just the tip of the iceberg ladies and gentlemen. Totalitarianism, socialism, statism, whatever you wanna call it, here it comes in the USA.
15 comments:
God judges nations through historical events. To suggest, as one has in another thread below, that Obama was re-elected because the Church and the Bishops have been wrong all these centuries is ludicrous. This nation has consistently chosen anti-life, anti-Church, and morally bankrupt social policy for some decades now. Our government has aggressively moved to eliminate any expression of Christian belief from every aspect of public life. Our leaders and the court prophets of the media demean the Church either through empty lip service or open scorn. We have actively courted the pagan and anti-Christian religion of Islam. Do you not think that God's perfect and permissive will is instrumental in our continued decline and demise?
What were Israel's sins that were such an affront to God's Righteousness...cultural syncretism, false worship, moral equivalence, sexual aberration, compromise with surrounding Baal worshipping nations. I am not making some simplistic doom-saying-repent-the-end-is-near (although never discount the possibility)jack leg evangelist "prophecy." I am saying that, for a long, long time now, we have been living in disobedience at the most fundamental level of national life. Scripture and the Church teach that this will ultimately have consequences in historical time and political life. (cont'd)
cont'd
Now, don't talk about hurricanes, earthquakes, and tornadoes as God's judgement. That is too easy..."Oh, God got mad and sent a hurricane to NY." No, no...God judges us through those events brought about by our will, our intention, national and individual. There is no casting our guilt and responsibility onto natural events. Believing in God is more than assent to some doctrines; it is the molding of our will to His and the effort to embody that will in social and political life. There is no "separation of Church and State" for the Christian. That isn't in the Constitution, anyway.
When Christ said, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's and to God the things that are God's," he wasn't making a list. He was saying "get your priorities straight." So, just what is Caesar's and what is God's?
There is a Christian koan for you...
We are experiencing the inevitable conclusion caused by the Bishop's failures over decades. Most recently, they have failed us by this farcical "religious freedom" campaign. They did so in many ways. Chiefly, they failed to define the phrase "religious liberty" for the laity.
Think about the ramifications of the recent pronouncements by the US bishops. They imply that we are fighting for freedom for all religions to believe and practice. Therefore, the logical result is that Catholics should vote for Obama and pro-same-sex marriage amendments because if everyone should have freedom to practice their religion, the Church should not e dictating moral laws upon non-adherents.
Of course, if most lay people heard the actual teaching on religion tolerance and its exclusivity, they would become very uncomfortable as it would force them to confront the relativistic system that ha been forced down our throats under the name of religious freedom.
Fr. McDonald handled this quite well in his homilies leading up to the election. But his remarks were undermined by things like the USCCB's voting guide, Cardinal Dolan's scandalous behavior, and the utter silence of the rest of the bishops on any subject other than the blanket, amorphous phrase "religious liberty".
The ship sailed as soon as the Church in America took its seat alongside the other religions as if She were merely one amongst equals. Now we see the logical result of that complacency and the Bishops' desire to be cozy with Caesar.
Can't help but notice that Obama's (re)election coincides with the 50th anneversary of V2 and all the good it was to bring...Hope it doesnt rain on the parade
Gene says that “God judges nations through historical events. . . . [F]or a long, long time now, we have been living in disobedience at the most fundamental level of national life. Scripture and the Church teach that this will ultimately have consequences in historical time and political life. . . . God judges us through those events brought about by our will, our intention, national and individual.”
It is difficult to disagree with this statement. One need only think about the devastating tragic personal and social consequences that flow from disregard of divine and natural law in the area of sex – STDs, including HIV and AIDS; the destruction of human life, psychological scarring, and loss to the entire human family that result from abortion, etc. These are the inevitable natural consequences that flow from our failures to abide by divine and natural law -- in other words, these are the consequences that result from our human sinfulness.
But don’t we need to think beyond these so-called “pelvic issues”? For example, didn’t our national sinfulness cause the current economic crisis – our avarice and our envy (although we can argue about whose sinfulness contributed exactly what proportion to bringing about the ultimate result)?
And isn’t it conceivable that human sinfulness also played a part in making Hurricane Sandy such a devastating storm for the northeast? I keep an open mind on whether man-made climate change is a reality. But, if it is, might not the fierceness of storms such as Hurricane Sandy simply be the natural result of our own failures as a nation, and more broadly of humanity as a whole, to care for Creation properly – in other words, once again might it not be due to our own human sinfulness as we fail to be good stewards of the gifts of Creation? In this way, then, couldn't hurricanes, earthquakes, and tornadoes indeed be God’s judgment in that sometimes they, or at least their intensity, may be the inevitable natural consequences that God has built into Creation as flowing from our disobedient or sinful human acts or omissions? And why do so many victims of Hurricane Sandy still not have power? How far is it due to the failure of the company with the utility franchise to make the necessary investments to upgrade its infrastructure and equipment, or to the failure of elected leaders to engage in proper vetting and to demand proper professional performance from that company – again, how far is it due to human sinfulness?
And why do we have over 9000 firearm-related murders in the United States per year but Britain, with one sixth of the population, has fewer than 20 (thus equivalent to fewer than 120 adjusted for population difference)? Doesn’t human sinfulness explain the discrepancy? But whose sinfulness, and again in what proportion?
People often ask how God can allow terrible natural or man-made disasters to occur. As I understand it, a large part of the traditional answer to this question of theodicy is our free will. So, we could make transportation safer, for example, if we were prepared to spend more time and money on greater safety measures; we could prevent many deaths caused by tsunamis if we spent the time and money to install adequate early warning systems; we could prevent much hostility and secure greater peace by seeking to achieve greater justice etc, etc.
We don’t live in a perfect world. We live in a fallen, broken world – fallen and broken in so many ways. This is why I appreciate the holistic emphasis of the CCC and of the USCCB voting guide that some others on this Blog lament. They challenge us to think of_all_the many ways in which we can and do sin, rather than focusing on sexual sins alone, important though those undoubtedly are.
Marc - The Constitutional protection of Religion (and Religions) is the basis of the Bishops' "Fortnight for Freedom" program. So, yes, the Bishop are "fighting for freedom for all religions" as provided for by our Constitution.
This is right and just.
Pater, that would certainly make more sense in explaining the bishops' actions and discussions.
How, though, is it right and just for Catholic bishops to support the freedom of false religions? That isn't really in accord with Catholic teaching...
Moreover, I don't think the bishops are well enough versed in Constitutional Law to be arguing from that perspective. Nor do I trust their interpretation of the law in that or any other regard.
Marc,
I was wondering about Pater’s Constitutional Law point too and almost posted a comment yesterday seeking input from Anon 5, who is surely our resident constitutional law expert. I thought he might be able to respond particularly to your intimation that if one accepts free exercise of religion, then one is logically compelled to accept practices that an adherent claims is part of that fee exercise (gay marriage, for example?). However, my relatively inexpert understanding is that the Supreme Court has recognized definite limits on First Amendment free exercise (polygamy, for example).
On the false religions point, the response would be that recognizing the freedom of religion in the case of other religions is not, in fact, inconsistent with Catholic teaching. But do we really want to go down that well trodden road again?
Marc - The bishops are arguing that under the Constitution we, and all other religions, have rights and responsibilities that cannot be infringed by government. In this they are correct and doing what they should be doing. And in this they are in no way acting against catholic doctrine.
The Bishops' Conference has staff lawyers who advise the bishops on legal matters. They are receive advice from attorneys in private practice, some of them being among the best in the nation.
Pater, your response is a good one. I'm sure the USCCB has fine lawyers on staff. As a lawyer myself, I really wouldn't want that job.
I question, though, in light of where our country is whether their fight is a good one (from a pragmatic perspective). What I mean is, the argument against us is also based on Constitutional arguments about freedom of religion. That is, those who are for the questionable parts of Obamacare are arguing that freedom of religion means freedom from religion in this case. By supporting the secular, Constitutional concept of religious freedom, the bishops have confused the issue because the phrase for most people in modern America conjures issues of separation of Church and State, a phrase that cuts against the Church in this instance (but A5 can educate us on the proper meaning of that phrase).
But, I concede you are probably right about what the bishops were trying to accomplish.
The State, as the State, will always trump religion. Altough our government and Constitution have allowed provisions for the free exercise of religion, the concept of "State" does not include or demand such provisions. It is also the nature of government, the State, to encompass more and more of the activities and structures within its boundaries. After all, the State, whether benign or not, is designed to rule. There is a powerful philosophical imperative (which also has a strong theological justification...that is part of the problem)inherent in all political structures: men must be governed. Our founders were at least prescient enough to understand the expansive and self-augmenting nature of government and to write in some basis for limiting the Leviathan. It is not working.
Throughout history,the Church and the State have had, shall we say, a dialectical relationship (that's a philosophical joke)...it has nearly always been an uneasy alliance and has often been an opposition. Too often, the Church has gone hat-in-hand to the State seeking accomodations. This is always a mistake. If you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas. In this country now, in regard to this HHS mandate, the Church is genuinely opposed to the State. She will not win. The State has the perogoratve of simply ignoring the Church and, ultimately, taking action against her. In this country, the State has succeeded in bringing such huge numbers of its citizens into economic and social dependence upon her that "we the people" now have little voice. "We the people's" voice is merely an echo of State dictates and policy. Religion is viewed by the State, a la Rousseau, Voltaire, and the Philosophes, as a useful moral control for the masses.
The Church is on her own...as Christ said she would be. Seeking accomodations from government is demeaning to her and a waste of time. If the Gospel is properly embodied and preached in her life, and if she is able to gather her sheep to "repent and believe the Gospel," then perhaps a change may be effected through the actions of a renewed and devout populace. I do not look for it, but we cannot fathom God's purposes.
Marc - Yes, from a pragmatic perspective, the bishops should continue to argue that the HHS mandate is a violation of our Constitutional right to Freedom of Religion. I believe the courts will agree with that argument.
When we have two opposing views of what is/is not Constitutional, the courts decide the issue. When white people said that racial segregation was necessary and that the Constitution allowed for "separate but equal" schools, the Courts told them they were wrong. (Brown v Board of Education, correcting the earlier error of Plessy v Ferguson).
There is nothing confusing in the Bishops seeking redress under the Constitution. There is nothing un-Catholic about the Constitutional non-establishment clause, either.
I suspect - I HOPE - that when you practice law you do so according to the secular laws, appeal to the courts and /or juries under those secular laws, and act in your capacity as an officer of the court according to the secular understanding of that role.
And I suspect that you do not find your actions under secular law "confusing" the issue.
What's the big deal? The Church, through the Campaign for Human Development, has been supporting birth control and abortion, and probably gay marriage, for years now. European bishops own publishers that print pornography. I heard of a couple bishops in Europe that own part of a strip/sex club. You can't deny that the Catholic social justice model, dating back to Pope Leo XIII, has inspired/been the bluprint for much of the Democratic party. Compare that to when a few years ago Congress wanted to install a Catholic priest as the chaplin, and it was the Republicans who rallied against Catholicism, while the Democrats supported the priest, who eventually was installed. This situation of America becoming more and more liberal... face it... the Catholic Church kind of paved the way for it. You can't really complain if they go a little further than the Church would like. I predict (and I am not clairvoyant, or am I?) Obama will cut a deal with the USCCB that will exempt the Church from paying for things they officially or technically oppose, and the Bishops in turn will embrace Obama and his policies. Expect this before the 2014 midterm elections.
Sadly, liberal shmiberal, you are probably exactly right. The USCCB is no friend of Catholic morality or traditional Catholic identity. If Obammy gives them a sop, they will embrace him and feel all warm and liberal and sticky wet.
Once again, I find myself agreeing with much of what Gene has written but wanting to broaden it out. I believe that Gene has essentially identified the problem as the libido dominandi, the human lust for power. In this he is surely right. But if that is indeed the problem, then doesn’t it extend beyond the State? Historically, hasn’t it at times even corrupted the Church itself? And what about “civil society”? For example, did the Founders anticipate the concentration of economic power in mega-corporations and the capture of the levers of government by such concentrated economic power? Who can tame_them_ other than the State? Weren’t the Founders’ notions of capitalism and a “free market” premised on very different considerations from those we experience in our contemporary economies? (Several decades later, Tocqueville perhaps caught a glimpse of the shape of things to come, though.) And did the Founders imagine the scale and complexity of our current circumstances and the manifold challenges that we face as individuals, as a nation, and as a human race?
So, instead of “constitutional fundamentalism” don’t we need to adapt core constitutional principles to current circumstances or else risk the same fate as other fundamentalisms in the world that refuse to face the reality of inevitable change? Do we even have a choice?
But isn’t it a central Christian message that the use of power to fight power risks becoming what one hates and that ultimately and most profoundly the true way forward is the inward metanoia of heart, mind, and spirit? But in the meantime, and in our broken world, even though the use of power may indeed be necessary, perhaps we can at least have open eyes so we can recognize who has power over whom and try to guard against its abuse as much as possible, both by others as well as by ourselves.
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