Religion vs. Healthcare: Weighing in on the Contraception Mandate of the Affordable Healthcare Act

Religion vs. Healthcare

Weighing in on the Contraception Mandate of the Affordable Healthcare Act

By: Tom Cara, President, FFRFMCC  – (Copyright 2013) – 3/17/13

According to many Christians, the “oppression” of Christian groups in the U.S. just keeps getting worse.  The latest “attack” salvo we are told is being aimed at religiously affiliated businesses that have demanded the right to claim exemption from the contraception coverage mandate of the Affordable Healthcare Act on the grounds it violates their First Amendment right to freedom of religious expression.  President Obama of course has conceded this exemption through his constant desire to pacify the many religious factions in this country.

The Catholic Church, not surprisingly, led the charge against the contraception mandate under the Affordable Healthcare Act.  Their claim was that they could not be forced to have their employees’ contraception covered under their healthcare plans, primarily because their religious doctrine seems to have some kind of problem with the vastly accepted socio-cultural and scientific views on the usefulness of contraception.

In a recent Gallup poll, 82% of Catholics considered contraception “Morally Acceptable” (Gallup, May, 2012).  And while the reliability of data suggesting 98% of Catholic women aged 15-44 use birth control methods deemed unacceptable by the Catholic Church has been disputed[1], it must certainly be apparent to many that if the actual percentage was even one-half that figure, it should still be considered a troubling dilemma for the Catholic Church.

Personally, I have many Catholic friends and acquaintances who have seemingly decided that conceiving no more than one or two children is just the right size for their families.  I never ask them whether or not contraception plays a role in their lives.  It is none of my business.  But I would have to say if it does not, then they have successfully bucked the laws of nature.  Nor do I ask them whether or not their priest has questioned them with suspicion as to why they have so few children.

One could easily conclude the Catholic Church does not enforce the doctrinal law regarding contraception they claim to hold in such high regard.  How many documented cases have there been of parishioners getting excommunicated by the Catholic Church on the grounds they violated the church’s religious taboo of using contraception?  Must we really ask the question why such action is rarely, if ever, taken against the flock they rely upon so heavily to maintain their revenue stream?

Yes, this is the same Catholic Church that for decades, and likely even centuries, has protected pedophile priests and bishops from prosecution by using the argument that such protection is a constitutional form of religious expression.

Yes, this is the same Catholic Church that uses its power to influence legislation to restrict a woman’s right to a legal abortion by arguing that life begins at conception.  And then turns around to defend itself from charges that one of its hospitals, by refusing to perform an emergency caesarian section on a woman seven months pregnant with twin boys, allowed both the mother and children to die.  Believe it or not, they actually used the argument they couldn’t be held responsible for the children’s deaths on the grounds that the state where this occurred does not legally recognize an unborn child to be considered a life[2].  So instead of standing with their religious principles, the Church used the laws of our government to protect itself because it was financially prudent to do so.

The Catholic Church uses constitutionally protected religious expression when it is convenient for them to ignore government laws they do not like.  Then they use government laws when it is convenient to protect them from criminal and civil litigation when their religious principles and faith in a god appear to be no help to them.

But the looming question we must ask ourselves is: “What would our world look like if the Catholic Church, or any private institution for that matter with the same agenda, had enough power throughout the land to prevent anyone from using contraception?”  After all, isn’t this the goal they hope to accomplish?  And this horrendously ignorant philosophy is spreading to areas of the world where the Catholic population is growing most rapidly, particularly in the AIDS-ravaged continent of Africa.

In answer to the question, without contraception such a rapid increase in population would result in people dying of starvation at alarming rates due to a depleted food supply; or dying from a constant state of war from the need to gain control of that food supply; or they would die from an uncontrollable pandemic of sexually transmitted diseases.  And no, the solution would not be expecting people to resist their natural human urges and learn to abstain from sexual intercourse.  None of these are desirable options, and I see no positive outcome for humanity in following the Catholic Church’s lead on this subject.

Strangely, the Catholic Church’s entire platform on contraception, and the reason why they allow themselves to condone only the Rhythm Method of family planning (having sex only when the wife is not ovulating), can be traced back to but a few paragraphs in the Old Testament (Genesis 38: 1-10).  This would be the story of Onan, whose father forced him to marry his brother Er’s wife Ta’ mar because Er had so angered God that God had no other choice but to kill him.  Under Judaic law, the surviving eldest unwed son must marry the deceased son’s widow to preserve the family line.  Onan however, knowing the children would not be counted as his own, could not bring himself to spill his seed into his sister-in-law when they had sex.  Thus he had invented what is known today as the “Withdrawal Method.” And since this too had angered God, he decided to kill Onan as well.  So from then on, whenever a male chose to spill his seed outside of a woman (and this included masturbation), this became known as “Onanism” and was considered an abomination against God.   Only when medically effective forms of contraception were invented did the church have to modify its definition of “Onanism” from spilling the male seed outside of the woman, to preventing the seed from actually reaching or fertilizing the woman’s egg.

So there we have it, a very lucid explanation (sarcasm fully intended) as to why religious beliefs should be allowed to interfere with the lives and healthcare of millions of people in the United States.  And in turn, create millions of unwanted children the Church has no intention of caring for.

The Catholic Church is really one of the few remaining religious orders that refuse to leave the Middle Ages on this topic, as others have succumbed to the modern economic rationalization of limiting family sizes.  Even God must have given up on the subject since he doesn’t seem to kill people anymore for committing “Onanism.”  One would think the Catholic Church might accept the fact that since it doesn’t appear God has killed anyone since Onan for performing this “abomination,” perhaps he’s changed his mind on this subject and that maybe they should as well.

And let’s be logical about this.  If contraception really was that much of a hot button with God, but he no longer felt justified in killing people over it, he could, in his omnipotence, simply administer his punishment by not allowing the “offenders” to ever have any children at all.  One might then be able to point to such a sign as a true indication of God’s existence.  But alas, we don’t even have that. And even the Catholic Church does not pay much attention anymore regarding how many married Catholic couples use contraception in their marriage until they decide the time is right for them to have children, with most easily being able to conceive (with God’s grace the faithful must concede) once they cease using birth control methods. One could look at this as either more evidence against the existence of  a god, or that perhaps he simply does not care about what’s in the bible.

Why then does the Catholic Church hold firm to this position of condemning contraception to the point where they demand their parishioners breed until they are no longer able to do so? I will leave this as an open-ended question, but the answer should be obvious. There is strength in numbers and this is nothing but an issue of achieving and maintaining wealth and power.

By allowing religious organizations to dictate the contraception issue by standing on freedom of doctrinal beliefs, we then have to consider how many future doors this would open for them to seek exemptions from in the important area of medicine.  And it cannot be emphasized enough that any medical issues are private matters between an individual and their doctor, not an individual and their employer.

Should any business though, religious or not, have the right to claim exemption from participating in a governmentally mandated program that has been designed to assist in the common welfare of its citizens?  For example, can a religious organization deny paying an employee a federally guaranteed minimum wage, or having to contribute to an employee’s Social Security or Medicare programs simply on the grounds of a religious belief?  The answer of course is no, because constitutional interpretation has generally maintained the common good should supersede any privately held belief.  This is one reason why we no longer burn witches.

But the reality is, even constitutional rights have limits.  Freedom of speech does not give someone the right to yell “fire” in a crowded theater, or stand in a public square screaming they want to kill the President.  And just because you feel you have a constitutional right to own a gun, doesn’t mean you can conduct target practice with empty bottles in a public park.  And just because you have a right to a trial by a jury of your peers does not mean you get to pick your own jury.  Nor should freedom of religious expression be an unregulated right for a business, religious or not, to dictate public policy where people’s health and economic welfare are involved.  To exist as an intelligent, rational society, we must always be cognizant of where the line must be drawn.