In the Wall Street Journal, Patrick J. Reilly reports that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has ruled that Catholic institutions must pay for birth control in their health insurance plans:
Last week, thanks to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the federal government took a giant leap toward encroaching on the religious liberty of Catholics. Reuben Daniels Jr., director of the EEOC District Office in Charlotte, N.C, ruled that a small Catholic college discriminated against female employees by refusing to cover prescription contraceptives in its health insurance plan. With health-care reform looming before the country, this ruling is a bad omen for people of faith.
In 2007, eight faculty members filed a complaint against Belmont Abbey College in Belmont, N.C., claiming that the school’s decision to exclude prescription contraceptives from its health-care plan was discriminatory against women. “As a Roman Catholic institution, Belmont Abbey College is not able to and will not offer nor subsidize medical services that contradict the clear teaching of the Catholic Church,” said the college’s president, William Thierfelder, at the time.
[. . .]
The ruling against the college is certainly consistent with the commission’s published guidance on “pregnancy discrimination.” The EEOC has found that contraceptive coverage is mandated by the 1978 Pregnancy Discrimination Act (even though the law concerns pregnant women and does not, by strict interpretation, consider discrimination against all women of childbearing potential). North Carolina also has made its position clear with a law requiring employers to cover employees’ contraceptive expenses if other prescription drugs are insured.
The difference, however, between the EEOC’s guidance and the North Carolina law is that the latter exempts religious employers such as a Catholic college, whereas the commission fails to consider that the tenets of a faith may preclude an institution from offering such benefits.
And that’s the rub: Increasingly it is clear to Catholics and other religious groups that without very clear exemptions for religious employers—and conscience protections for individual doctors, nurses, pharmacists—federal health-care laws and guidelines could severely restrict religious freedom in the U.S. . . .,
Perhaps there are those who would say that this is an issue for only a minority of religious people. Catholics are nearly alone in their objection to contraceptives—and many Catholics regularly violate the church’s teaching on the issue. But consider abortion. The EEOC says that pregnancy discrimination does not apply to an employer’s refusal to cover abortion expenses, “except where the life of the mother is endangered.” When will a federal court argue that if insurance coverage to prevent pregnancy is, by inference, mandated by the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, then why not abortion to end a pregnancy?
(Via: Gene Veith)
October 23rd, 2009 | 1:02 pm
That’s crazy. This isn’t discriminating against conscience as much as is it is in discriminating against rationality.
Employers don’t have to give health benefits at all. And even when they do, it’s impossible to get coverage for *everything*. I’ve yet to see a health coverage plan that covers bunions, arthritis, or foot odor. Whenever you cut off an option, you discriminate by definition.
So discrimination in policy exists and is necessary. There is similarly no discrimination against women since men are also denied birth control, and it takes two to make a baby, and legally, both are responsible.
October 23rd, 2009 | 1:33 pm
[...] found this story on First Things: In the Wall Street Journal, Patrick J. Reilly reports that the Equal Employment [...]
October 23rd, 2009 | 3:43 pm
Mr. Carter, I wonder, did you read the comments to this story before you posted? If not, then maybe you should do so now and reconsider your post. According to the comments this school went out of its way to argue in court that it is NOT a religious institution. They did this to receive federal money. Then they turn around and say they should not have to pay for contraceptive coverage because they ARE a religious institution. The comments also note that the school allows a pharmacy on its grounds that offers RU-486. So there’s more here than initially meets the eye.
October 23rd, 2009 | 6:30 pm
The whole idea of a pregnancy non-discrimination act seems silly. When a woman gets pregnant, she should be prepared to deal with the consequences, good and bad, of that choice. Why should everyone around her be forced — shall we say discriminated against — to make accommodations for her choice, whether it be to have children or not to have them? Is that not the responsibility of her own family? I suspect this is a simple matter of women wanting to have their cake and eat it too.
The thing about discrimination, though, is that everyone does it. We do it, and we cannot NOT do it. We make choices every day about who we like, who we don’t like, who we will associate with and who we will not and how we will do it. It’s interesting how such a bland word has come to represent evil incarnate.
October 23rd, 2009 | 7:13 pm
Joe,
What about Bibbit’s comment? If Bibbit is right, then this is a real problem for Belmont Abbey.
Let us know more.
October 23rd, 2009 | 11:07 pm
The pharmacy in question is a Wal-Mart, on lands leased from the Abbey. It’s hardly the campus health center. It’s problematic that Wal-Mart sells these products, and that the revenues from the enterprise as a whole (of which the pharmacy is not the sum total) support the Abbey, but it’s also not a little disingenuous to imply, ambiguously, that the college is hypocritically allowing the morning-after pill to be handed out (to students, you’d immediately presume) in the shadow of the church spire. This is not the case at all, though apparently Professor Neipert, whose responses dominate the combox, doesn’t mind letting people think that it is.
The college has wandered in the wilderness in years past, with regard to its identity. Not all administrations have shared the current, relatively new administration’s commitment to Catholic orthodoxy, and though I haven’t read the particulars of the case to which the comments allude, my supposition is that this is years old, under a previous administration.
The college is in fact committed to hiring Catholic faculty, attracting Catholic students, and offering an authentically Catholic education, a mission which has not been universally popular, as Professor Neipert’s comments also make abundantly clear.
A response to Professor Neipert’s arguments: http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/faith/2009/10/yaakov_menken_belmont_abbey.html#more
October 24th, 2009 | 12:27 am
I’m glad you added to this, Ms. Thomas. It’s a shame the link you provided wasn’t in the original post. Still, I think this is a bit more confusing than one is led to believe by the original post. But in the end it is nonetheless scary that this administration’s EEOC people are so willing, maybe even eager, to rule against the college and people of faith.
October 24th, 2009 | 8:20 am
Thank you to Sally Thomas for the clarification. Do I remember correctly that Walmart was required by the federal government to provide RU-486? In order to fully understand the complexities of this matter, one would need to know exactly what the college agreed to in leasing to Walmart (did RU-486 even exist at the time?) and who had the power to require that the drug be dispensed.
October 24th, 2009 | 8:21 am
It’s worth noting, too, that the numbers which Prof. Neipert cites with regard to the Catholic identity of the student body both reflect, and don’t reflect, a certain reality. Belmont Abbey has, in essence, two student bodies: traditional, resident undergraduates, an increasing number of whom are Catholic and come to the college precisely because it is a Catholic college; and a large adult degree program, in which people enroll because it’s there. The latter population are largely not Catholic.
While on paper it certainly appears that the college is far less “sectarian” than it claims to be, in terms of student affiliations, the numbers without that gloss are misleading. In recent years, the college has actively recruited Catholic students, and has made every provision possible, given that faculty hiring committees are not fully on board, to ensure that new hires either are Catholic or are willing to accommodate the college’s commitment to Catholic moral teaching.
In the interest of full disclosure, I should say that I’m currently a beneficiary of the very healthcare plan in question here, and I have a strong vested interest in seeing the EEOC ruling overturned. The alternative, that the college should lose and the monastery should opt to close it, would be a disaster for my family. All the same, as Prof. Neipert has been so publicly vocal in accusing the college of hypocrisy, I thought it only right to provide some balance to his accusations.
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