Do the Bishops Have a Case Against Obama?
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Religion often comes alive in the face of persecution. Recently, Daniel Jenky, the bishop of Peoria, Ill., did not hesitate to play the persecution card in the dispute with the Obama administration over required health insurance coverage of birth control. Evoking the history of “terrible persecution” of the Church, he said: “Hitler and Stalin would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services and health care. . . . Barack Obama — with his radical, pro-abortion and extreme secularist agenda — now seems intent on following a similar path.” In an effort to clarify the statement, a diocese spokesperson said, “We certainly have not reached the same level of persecution. However, history teaches us to be cautious once we start down the path of limiting religious liberty.” (She did not explain just what the bishop regarded as the Church’s current “level of persecution” by the administration.)
Jenky’s remarks are only a bit more extreme than standard rhetoric from bishops and other conservative Catholics, who now routinely talk of an “attack” or “war” on religious liberty. Are things really this bad? Or are we seeing a perhaps politically motivated “tempest in a holy water fount”?
To get some perspective, I propose to take a look at the main rational arguments — as opposed to rhetorical appeals — that the bishops and their supporters put forward.
The first argument is based on the right of conscience. It agrees that all employees of a Catholic organization have a right in conscience to practice birth control, but that the organization also has a right in conscience not to pay for (or otherwise facilitate) the practice. The nub of the argument is that an organization’s not offering birth control as part of its health insurance does not take away an employee’s right to birth control; it would at most make it a bit more difficult to obtain. By contrast, the administration’s requirement that the organization offer birth control coverage does eliminate, in this case, its right not to support the practice.
This argument makes a valid point, but omits the rights of a third party: the government, which has a right (and duty) to set up rules for the common good of the nation. In some cases, this right takes precedence over the rights of conscience. The government has the right, for example, to force people to serve in wars they think are unjust or pay taxes to support activities like birth control that they think are immoral. Organized religions have, in our system, greater rights to conscientious exemption than individuals, but there is no absolute immunity that keeps a religion’s claim of conscience from being trumped by the government’s right to “provide for the general welfare.” Once we take account of the government’s right, we see that this argument does nothing to show that Catholic organizations’ rights outweigh the rights of the government in this case. [More]
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5 Comments
The single best argument against Gutting is his assumption that the Government has rights – it does not. All power that the government lays claim to arises from the governed. It has no ‘rights’ in and of itself; so, for a Catholic Philosopher to maintain this position is very surprising and very sloppy.
You can depend on the bobbleheads to bobble.
How does Gary Gutting keep his job as professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, much less as editor of Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews. He sounds anything but Catholic. His essay was dripping with such anti-Catholic venom; it’s as if he has a major chip on his shoulder and is looking to pick a fight. Some people think they should always challenge authority and conventional wisdom. At Gutting’s age, he may have gotten away with challenging conventional wisdom for so long, he may actually believe his own rhetoric and hyperbole.
Gutting’s logic falls apart, however, when he puts the rights of the government OVER the rights of the Church by claiming that since the government is providing for the “general welfare” (evidently the “greater good”) it automatically has the inherent right to trample any religions rights. This is a false argument – a red hearing. Another false argument he makes is that the Church should not be the sole arbiter of what it should believe. Just who does he think should make that decision?
Gutting then opens the door to the possibility it is OK to restrict religious rights if it is only a partial restriction, not a total restriction against those religious beliefs. Does Gutting truly believe the government has the right to restrict individual freedoms as long it is not wholesale totalitarianism? Or is he merely picking a fight for the fun of it?
Gutting then turns the table 180 degrees by making final judgment himself that the Bishops have not proven the right of government to do its job of promoting the general welfare should be limited in favor of the right of religious believers to be true to their consciences.
Gutting then accuses the Bishops of often having demagogic reaction and overdramatizing what should be a “routine disagreement.” Gutting tries to separate the Bishops from the “Faithful” by claiming the Bishops are out of touch and isolated from most Church members, especially on matters of sexuality. Does he think the Bishops should change Church Teaching to appease those of fading faith? He then tries to attribute political rather than religious motives to the Bishops, but does not state what political motives nor why, except to speculate the Bishops are simply making a power grab. Gutting tries to rally the reader to see through the deception of the Bishops to the point he comes across to me as an Evangelical preacher at a revival meeting. Gutting reminds me of a rebelious child that never grew up – only got older.
I am sorry but I disagree with your argument. You state that the government has the right to set up rules for the common good. You have wronly assumed that contraception is a common good. Contraception is condemed by the Catholic Church because it causes great harm to society. Examples: Increased abortions, sexual promiscuity, distruction of the family unit,divides man and wife.
Very well written and very thoughtful. Unfortunately in many cases it will all fall on closed minds!