Nearly a month ago, I wrote about Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), co-chair of th Congressional Progressive Caucus, who called for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to lose their tax exempt status. Rep. Woolsey was a bit peeved that the Catholic Bishops were such EFFECTIVE at getting the anti-abortion-funding Stupak Amendment included in the House’s health care bill.
Now, a group of 13 religious organizations are lobbying the Senate to essentially reject any Stupak-like amendment to the Senate’s health care bil. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have already endorsed such an amendment, known as the Nelson-Hatch-Casey amendment, which would prohibit abortion coverage from a public-health insurance option and from private insurance plans that receive federal subsidies.
A letter from the thirteen religious organizations reads:
The passage of meaningful health reform legislation will make significant strides toward accomplishing the important goal of access to health care for all. Unfortunately, the House-passed version of health reform includes language that imposes significant new restrictions on access to abortion services. This provision would result in women losing health coverage they currently have, an unfortunate contradiction to the basic guiding principle of health care reform. Providing affordable, accessible health care to all Americans is a moral imperative that unites Americans of many faith traditions. The selective withdrawal of critical health coverage from women is both a violation of this imperative and a betrayal of the public good.
The use of this legislation to advance new restrictions on abortion services that surpass those in current law will serve only to derail this important bill. The Senate bill is already abortion neutral, an appropriate reflection of the fact that it is intended to serve Americans of many diverse religious and moral views. The bill includes compromise language that maintains current law, prohibiting federal funds from being used to pay for abortion services, while still allowing women the option to use their own private funds to pay for abortion care. American families should have the opportunity to choose health coverage that reflects their own values and medical needs, a principle that should not be sacrificed in service of any political agenda.
We urge the Senate to support meaningful health reform that maintains the compromise language on abortion services currently in the bill.
Signatories include Catholics for Choice, Disciples Justice Action Center, The Episcopal Church, Jewish Women International, NA’AMAT USA, the National Council of Jewish Women, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Washington Office, the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, The Religious Institute, the Union for Reform Judaism, the United Church of Christ, Justice and Witness Ministries, the United Methodist Church-General Board of Church and Society, and the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations.
If these pro-choice religious groups are successful in their lobbying efforts, I wonder if Rep. Woolsey will call for an IRS investigation as well?
HT: George Frink
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This group’s president, Rev. Carlton Veazey (a minister of the National Baptist Convention U.S.A.) said recently that abortion is a “God-given right.” The group’s letter says, in so many words, that publicly-funded abortion is a moral imperative.
The mainline signatories represent 4 of the 5 fastest declining denominations: Episcopal Church, PCUSA, United Church of Christ and United Methodist. (See NCC’s 2008 Yearbook of Churches).
I am going to go read Jeremiah.
Probably weren’t any signatories from the fastest growing churches in the United States: Jehovah’s Witnesses and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? These two churches, given data reported by NCC, are 2.04 and 1.48 standard deviation, respectively, above the mean, whereas the National Baptist and Southern Baptists are .23 and .40 standard deviation, respectively, above the mean. Whereas the ECUSA et al. are struggling, SBC is far from being in a place of being able to say, ‘hey, look at us.’
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