U.S. Bishops: Catholics should prepare for civil disobedience to HHS mandate
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Catholics in the United States should be prepared to engage in civil disobedience if the HHS mandate requiring employers to pay for contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs is not rescinded, says a new document from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
The USCCB released the one-pager as a bulletin insert to be distributed in Catholic Churches during June, in preparation for the Fortnight for Freedom, a two week period of prayer and fasting for the rescinding of the mandate.
“Some unjust laws impose such injustices on individuals and organizations that disobeying the laws may be justified,” the bishops write. “Every effort must be made to repeal them. When fundamental human goods, such as the right of conscience, are at stake, we may need to witness to the truth by resisting the law and incurring its penalties.”
The insert takes up some of the themes expounded on in a longer document released in April by the USCCB’s Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty, which also alluded to the possible need for non-violent resistance and compared the situation to that faced by the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s.
Like the April document, the insert calls the civil rights movement “an essentially religious movement,” and quotes Martin Luther King’s 1963 “Letter from Birmingham Jail” in which King cites St. Augustine’s dictum that “an unjust law is no law at all.”
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9 Comments
I find it troubling when anyone says another person isn’t Catholic because they disagree with the bishops. By that criteria, 90% of US “Catholics” wouldn’t be Catholic because they disagree with Church teaching on contraception.
I’m sorry, Dr. Lo: it isn’t only about contraception. Some people pride themselves on saying, “Separation of Church and State” and I say amen to that! The government has no right to make the Catholic Church _the_ Church of the United States (BTW, this was the ORIGINAL intent of that clause!). However, the government also has no right to order what defines a specific religion, like the Catholic Church. Please let me repeat: it isn’t only about contraception. I won’t say that anyone who disagrees with the bishops is not Catholic. However, they need to do a gut check as to whether they will support the Catholic Church in this… or go away like the rich young man: sad because he had too many attachments to the way the world thinks.
Indeed, Dr. Lo, 90% of those who call themselves Catholic actually are not Catholic. That actually is the sad state of affairs.
This will clearly be a litmus test of the political capitol that remains with the US bishops. With years of opaque financial management, fumbled closures of vibrant parishes, alienation of the laity, and perceived bullying of nuns and girl scouts, it will be interesting to see if there is enough credibility left with the USCCB to rally the people of God. From where I sit in the pew, there is a sense of great weariness with the church.
….Didn’t Jesus say something about “Rendering unto Cesar that which is Cesars’” ?
No Roman Catholic will be forced to buy,use or have any of the things that these silliness find offensive; but THOSE American Citizens, who are not under their control have the right to them!
When the Bishops call for a boycott of War,the immorality of Big business, the Death Penalty, then I’ll possibly act! This is Just another ploy to deflect attention from their Pedophilia and cover ups.
Get with it, Abbot — the bishops clearly have addressed child sexual abuse. What rock have you been living under? About ten years ago, they convened a national panel to study the issue and make recommendations, and those recommendations have already been implemented in my diocese and others throughout the USA. So, go grind your ax somewhere else, and face the fact that you are not Catholic. You have your own issue on which you are fixated, but it is an issue manufactured in your own mind, not based in reality.
OK. With respect, here’s some reading that may calm some of your concerns:
Avoiding War (CCC 2307ff especially 2309)
Big Business (Rerum Novarum, Centesimus Annus)
The Death Penalty (CCC 2266-2267, Evangelium Vitae: Para. 56)
BTW, I am thankful for the THOUSANDS of good priests who are being hurt by a relatively tiny percentage of men who violated the dignity of some of God’s children in direct violation of ordination their directives to love all. BTW, it’s spelled “Caesar”. And there was only one at any one time.
Also, just out of my own attempt to learn new stuff, in what order are you an abbot? I don’t recognize c.s.e.f. and can’t find it in the list of order abbreviations.
Sorry, it should read, “…violation of their ordination directives…”
Way to go, bishops! I’m in with you! It is time to fight, and what a tremendous witness to the culture that will provide.