The following comes from a February 18 Catholic News Agency article:
In a 2-1 decision delivered February 18, the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled against the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) in its challenge to the federal contraception mandate.
“We are disappointed in the Court’s refusal to protect our religious freedom,” EWTN chairman and CEO Michael Warsaw said.
“We simply want to continue to practice the same faith we preach to the world every day,” he said in a February 18 statement. “We are prayerful and hopeful that, if necessary, the Supreme Court will correct this critical error.”
EWTN Global Catholic Network was founded by Mother Angelica, a Franciscan nun. Its purpose is to share the Catholic faith across the globe. Reaching over 250 million homes in 144 different countries, it is the largest religious media network in the world and is among hundreds of organizations to challenge the Department of Health and Human Services mandate.
The mandate requires employers to offer health insurance plans covering contraception, sterilization and some drugs that can cause early abortions.
Employers who fail to comply with the mandate face crippling penalties. Many Catholic and non-Catholic organizations have filed lawsuits against the mandate, saying it violates religious freedom and compels them to act against their religious and moral beliefs.
Directly after delivering its ruling, the court placed its effects on hold until the Supreme Court rules on the mandate later this year. This protects EWTN from accumulating fines while waiting for the Supreme Court’s decision.
Ignorance is bliss. Because the Church has ceased teaching the truth to students for the past fifty years, is it a wonder why all these horrible things are coming to pass. If Catholics knew their faith, and had the devotion the Evangelicals have, none of these abnormalities would become mainstream. Instead of speaking against walls, and promoting social justice, the Pope should be addressing the tremendous ignorance Catholics have concerning their faith and morality.
Spot on! Some local churches believer it is their duty to comfort the afflicted, but not to afflict the comfortable, and most of these folks are rich in the world’s goods. Masses are packed, classrooms are full, but Adoration is shut down because no one shows up! Very sad. We do need a huge shaking up in this nation, and I pray every day for priests and bishops that they have the courage to speak the WHOLE truth.
Our Church had better get busy– and help to RE-CHRISTIANIZE our badly-fallen Nation! Or else, the Devil will completely destroy it! EWTN does much good — but it cannot substitute for a strong, world-wide Catholic evangelization, right in everyone’s backyard! Right in each and every parish, in every Nation! The Church has fallen down on her job, along with her Protestant neighbors— so, Satan has stolen mankind away from Our Lord!
Religion is being killed in this country by taxing it to death!
Really? Religion being TAXED to death? How does that work? Religion gets HUGE tax deductions. Enormous tax advantages. From the tax deductions its donors receive, to the non-taxed earnings on its profits, to the ministerial housing exemption. Name one TAX that threatens “religion”! (I assume that by “this country” you mean the US)
Very simple – the Obamacare TAX. The Supreme Court ruling on June 28, 2012 in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius upheld the Obamacare mandate under the TAXING power of Congress – declaring the penalty was a constitutional TAX. Many dozens of Catholic universities, religious orders, charities, and Catholic family owned businesses have filed suit thus far. If freedom of religion does not prevail, many of these organizations and institutions will be TAXED out of existence. That’s how it works, in answer to your question.
Obamacare is hardly a tax that taxes to death. It’s a few hundred dollars. However, not providing healthcare is a tax on the public that DOES cause death if the person does not have access to life saving preventative care. If you have a problem providing vaccines, screenings, wellness care, perhaps you want to look again at what constitutes “death”.
Obamacare imposes financial penalties of up to $100 per day, per employee for failure to provide “comprehensive health coverage” including contraceptive coverage. Hobby Lobby, for example, with 13,000 workers, estimated the penalty would cost it $475 million a year. I know exactly what constitutes death, but the word was initially used in this chain metaphorically (and also by you, although you rejected the premise) to refer to a severe imposition on religious freedom. The contraception mandate does exactly that. There are many ways to provide life saving preventative healthcare coverage without imposing immoral restraints on people like Little Sisters of the Poor for example.
There are minimal comments on this article because most people reading voted for Obama and agree with the mandate which requires Catholics to sponsor abortion health plans; and almost all use contraception which are abortion inducing.
Chris, you may be right, but I don’t think so. Most people don’t know what is going on or don’t understand it, in addition to not caring. Most people today don’t read newspapers, watch tv news, etc. They get info over their phones. Most people don’t understand the law either. No matter how much we oppose the ACA, and we do, the exemption is only given to strictly religious organizations, though I don’t understand how EWTN doesn’t qualify. An organization that hires anyone, services anyone, etc. is not deemed by law to be a religious organization. Elect people who will change the law.
Well, without Justice Scalia, these kinds of suits are now at risk. God permits evil, for His own purpose, and it is now evil’s day on Earth. America’s judiciary is inherently corrupt because its practitioners are without a moral compass; each judge now is pretty much a political player, with his office seen in electoral power terms, not legal or moral ones. The Nazi’s were very legal in terms of altering the legal bases by which it could strip Jews of their property rights, marriage rights, religious rights, and, ultimately, their right to survive. This is pretty much going to happen in the USA, except it will be people of faith that are the target, not only Jews.
The Catholic Church is in a self-destructive mode. It is suicide. She no longer stands for the eternal traditional truths, but is now falling for the latest social fads. Divorce, birth control, abortion, sodomy, transgenderism, and a total meltdown of Christian society can be blamed on the V2 Church for not preaching the Gospel. In Latin America, the Church teaches Marxism, and is shrinking, while the Evangelicals teach Christ crucified, and they are growing. Ave Maria Purrissima !
The Church which Jesus Christ established still stands strong, it is US who fail by giving into worldly and self-serving ideologies. WE have greatly sinned!
Bases or Basis? American sports or early 20th century German politics?.
Some often forget America, for better or worse, is NOT a theocracy. Under current secular law, those of other faiths have rights with which some may not agree–even judge to be totally against divine law. Work to change the secular law. Examples of the evil of an excessive theocracy abound in the certain areas of the world.
This is little different from the prior Homo-Nazi reich destroying their enemies ‘BAMN’ (By Any Means Necessary) – and Dachau (the first concentration camp) was opened by the Homosex Terrorist ‘SA’ (Storm Troopers) – it is said more Catholic Priests are buried there than any other location.
The ‘SA’ under command of Hitler’s Homosex Ephebophile boyfriend Ernst Rohm literally beat Germany in to submission – particularly for those who failed to return the stiff arm ‘heel’ salute.
This is little different – The Attack is on Catholic Conscience, to Force Abandonment of it in order to pander to the Gaystapo Thought Police of POTUS Barry ‘on the down low’ Soetoro – whoever the guy really is.
This disgusting equation of Nazi’s – real honest to God German 1940’s Nazis regardless of their sexual orientation – with today’s LGBT people and their fighting for their own equality is exactly that. Disgusting. And it goes against the terms of service of California Catholic Daily. But don’t let that stop the editors from enforcing their own terms of service.
No YFC you are just upset that you and the rest of the thought police cannot censor Mr. McDermott
The scholarship in exhaustive detail is presented in Lively & Abrams, The Pink Swastika: Homosexuality in the Nazi Party, c. 1995 by Founders Publishing, Oregon.
Nope, YFC, the parallel is quite apt. HomoFascists bring opprobrium on themselves by fighting against any accommodation by Catholics and other Christians. The Obama Administration loves sexual license and no responsibility. Standing up, like John the Baptist, might well cost you your head, but it is worth it to voice the Faith. But, this is preaching to the moral tone deaf, as sodomites, and abortionists, see no reason to cease their sins.
The Church has to pay taxes on real estate that is not used as a church. Rectories, parish halls, schools, convents (if there are any left) are all taxed. The parish also has to pay a payroll tax for all those who are employed. So, even though the church may qualify for not paying sales tax, she is obligated to pay other taxes. This is what my pastor informed me when I brought up the question to him.
FALSE. The Church pays NO TAX on the earnings collected every Sunday. The Church pays NO tax on the earnings given as gifts to convents, hospitals, rectories, halls, schools. etc. In fact, the donor gets a TAX BREAK for every single one of those donations. And a priest whose housing is not provided free of charge (and tax free) gets a pastoral HOUSING TAX BREAK on their personal income tax. Please don’t lie about the excessive tax breaks that churches receive. I suppose that if they are as inconsequential as you make them out to be, you wouldn’t mind if we take them away from you??
“Earnings given as gifts”?? What?? Gifts are not earnings, they’re gifts. Gifts are excluded from everyone’s taxable income, whether or not the donee is tax exempt. It’s the very reason birthday presents aren’t taxable. The difference is a donor to an exempt charity gets a deduction. Also, Catholic organizations are no different from any other charity exempt under IRC 501(c)(3) in that revenue by the organizational purpose is exempt. That includes Planned Parenthood, a 501(c)(3) tax exempt charity, which also receives over $300 million in annual government funding. In context, tax “breaks” to churches are hardly “excessive.”
As a matter of fact, rectories, parish schools and parish halls are specifically exempted from real estate taxation under California statute. I’m not sure about convents.
With a (now) 4-4 Supreme Court, the Appeals Court decision will be automatically upheld. EWTN should save their money.
Chris, I don’t think most readers have failed to comment on this article necessarily because they voted for Obama (YFC, Bob One, certain others excepted), but because most of us have accepted that the judiciary, the administrative system, and nearly all the political/police structure (especially here in CA) is stridently aligned against Christianity.
I have found it is best to avoid them all, pay off their fines should you somehow run afoul of their myriad snares, and retreat from the public square: Sorry, but some of us have a family to try to protect, and, for their good, perhaps a business to try to operate. One can run out in the streets and be a martyr for Christ oneself, but it is highly irresponsible to drag the…
…children of one’s family, disabled or elderly family members, etc, into that maelstrom.
Besides, this society is destined for imminent judgment—not just in the future, at Our Lord’s Coming, but much sooner. 1 Thess 4:1-6
Also a good read are the accounts of Fr. Magin Catala, “The Holy Man of Santa Clara”, and his prophetic utterances about what is to come for our beloved San Francisco Bay-theist Area.
Phoenix, lets be clear about this! I did not vote for Obama either time. Period.
Good to hear, restores my faith in humanity and in you, Bob One..
Hopefully the sufferings that Mother Angelica is undergoing can bring good out of this horrible evil.