Obama's Catholic hospital decision

[Insula Dei]

Good decision by Obama. Just because you may work at a catholic hospital shouldn't mean you don't get basic medical care.

Now you won't. The Church is going to end up cutting all medical benefits and paying the fine because of this.

If I understand what you're saying correctly , that would be a ridiculous thing to do (not to mention extremely un-Catholic). What happened to American Catholics' ability for doublethinking?

[Insula Dei]

You guys actually pray for an end to abortion in Mass?

Also, would the Catholic church actually be required to pay for abortions? Seems like only contraception falls under this.

[Insula Dei]

To clarify a point that has been brought up earlier, the mandate includes Plan B birth control that can be used as an abortificant if taken in a pregnancy. Thus many sources are claiming that the mandate does and doesn't include abortion (since it does not include abortion by surgical proceedure). So yes, this is a little more than condoms.

Again a significant number of Catholics would not consider 'morning after' methods of contraception an abortificant. Putting them on par with later term surgical abortions does some Catholic pro-lifers no good to their cause.

I'd disagree. Excluding the 'Morning After' Pill from the category 'Abortion' by extention defeats the argument against First Term Abortions. Nor should one allow pragmatical considerations ('Gee, this really won't play welll with your average Joe') to affect one's position on a morally loaded issue like this.

Considering this, I now officially would be unhappy with this decision. Still, Catholic hospitals have an even stronger obligation to pay for their employees' healthcare.

[Insula Dei]

Has anyone posted the data yet showing that 97-99% of Catholic women use contraception?

Popular as that factoid is, it doesn't make for a great argument against the Church's position as its religious beliefs are not determined by popular vote. Nor should they be.

[Insula Dei]

Has anyone posted the data yet showing that 97-99% of Catholic women use contraception?

Popular as that factoid is, it doesn't make for a great argument against the Church's position as its religious beliefs are not determined by popular vote. Nor should they be.

My point was more that this is been spun as some kind of devestating political blunder, which I don't think it is.

Yeah, it's not a devastating blunder (and certainly not in electoral terms), and the Church isn't being entirely reasonable here, but the Obama decision still strikes me as poor.

[Insula Dei]

Has anyone posted the data yet showing that 97-99% of Catholic women use contraception?

Popular as that factoid is, it doesn't make for a great argument against the Church's position as its religious beliefs are not determined by popular vote. Nor should they be.

My point was more that this is been spun as some kind of devestating political blunder, which I don't think it is.

Yeah, it's not a devastating blunder (and certainly not in electoral terms), and the Church isn't being entirely reasonable here, but the Obama decision still strikes me as poor.

the first time I've ever identified you as right-wing on a given issue.

I wouldn't know about that. My position for clarity's sake is just that people shouldn't be dependent on their employer for their health insurance. If you do make people dependent on their employer for it, you shouldn't force an employer to pay for mandatorily covered services which it is by principle opposed to. In cases like this there should be some form of secondary system to cover those costs. That doesn't strike me as a very right-wing position, all in all.  Maybe not a very 'liberal' position, I'll grant you that.