Church leaders who supported ObamaCare now outraged

“The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground.”  – Thomas Jefferson

The Obama administration’s U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has imposed a new mandate putting it at odds with the Catholic Church. It requires all employers — including faith-based ones — that offer health insurance, to provide and pay for all forms of contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs. The mandate will force Catholic hospitals, schools and charities, as well as other religious groups to provide these drugs despite their opposition to them.

Nationally, Bishops say the rule compromises religious freedom. In fact, the battle has raged so intensely that Catholics across America heard about the new provisions as they attended mass this past Sunday in a letter read from the pulpit addressing the church’s stance against the impending federal requirements.

Previously the government has created a “conscience clause,” allowing for  exemptions from regulations going against core beliefs.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has issued the following response to the February 2 post on the White House blog in which it takes the Obama administration to task. Read White House misrepresents its own contraceptive mandate here.

Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan, archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is outraged and urges Catholics and the public at large to contact congress in protest. Here he can be seen in a video criticizing the Obama administration.  This is the letter by Bishop Thomas J. Olmstead, Bishop of the Diocese of Phoenix that was read to Valley parishoners.

Yet the synchronized outrage raises questions of hypocrisy. Federally imposed ObamaCare first came to the public’s attention in 2009 as legislation introduced in both houses of Congress. At the time, Catholic Charities, the Society of St. Vincent DePaul, and the Catholic Health Association — three major Catholic charitable groups were vigorously supporting the newly introduced ObamaCare and rallying the faithful to contact Congress to help pass the legislation. This letter to members of Congress on USCCB letterhead not only urged support of ObamaCare, but specifically advocated for health care for “undocumented persons” calling it “mean-spirited” to do otherwise.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue is threatening that 70 Million Catholic voters are ready to alter the 2012 presidential election. And the USCCB is promising a lawsuit over the Obama provisions.

They appear to be learning too late that socialism is inherently evil. And when government creates “a right,” it can tell the people how to exercise it.

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