I noted this morning that the Obama HHS mandate has contributed to a crumbling of the Catholic left, and Matt Cantirino offered further evidence of that crack-up in the form of a column by E.J. Dionne. Now I see that even secular stalwarts are backing away from the administration’s decision. Here’s New York mag’s Jonathan Chait:
I think one relevant point here is that, by the standard of medical care, contraception is not terribly expensive. It’s not the sort of cost you need to insure against. If all medical care cost what contraception costs, there would be no such thing as “health insurance.” We would all just pay for it out of pocket.
Now, to be clear, I think the Church’s prohibition on contraception is absurd, and I’d like contraception to be as easily available as possible. But the importance of contraception to health insurance is relevant because the broader question is sorting out the line between a religious organization’s right to its own theology and the rights of nonbelievers, and the burden of sacrifice here seems out of whack.
I would bet that an increasingly isolated Obama administration is now considering the politics of a reversal.
January 30th, 2012 | 5:22 pm
I do think that most Americans have a basic sense that it’s not good for the government to demand that religions violate their own precepts unless absolutely necessary for some very important reason (such as “no burning widows on funeral pyres”). Making a religious group fund conduct they believe to be sinful will be a difficult sell, in my opinion.
But I have a related question for non-Catholics. I had assumed that most religions still think that fornication (sex outside of marriage) is a sin. In that case, wouldn’t these religious groups have any objection to facilitating this sin by paying for contraception for non-married people?
I haven’t heard any comments along these lines, and frankly, when I went looking for “official” statements about whether fornication is a sin on the websites of some of the mainline religions, I didn’t find very clear statements.
Any thoughts on whether other religious think: (1) sex outside marriage is a sin; and (2) such religions would/should oppose paying for contraception for unmarried people?
January 30th, 2012 | 7:44 pm
Any thoughts on whether other religious think: (1) sex outside marriage is a sin; and (2) such religions would/should oppose paying for contraception for unmarried people?
sally,
I am relatively sure that all Christian religions consider sex outside of marriage to be a sin, but it is so widely practiced and so widely tolerated that hardly any religion (even Catholicism) can plausibly claim to be all that concerned about it. Recall the post from a few months ago that told us “80 percent of unmarried evangelical young adults (18 to 29) said that they have had sex – slightly less than 88 percent of unmarried adults, according to the teen pregnancy prevention organization.”
I think I am correct in saying that the Catholic Church has no position on contraceptive use by unmarried couples. The Catholic position is that nobody who is not married should have sex. The Church says neither that unmarried people who have sex should not use contraception (because it is immoral) or that they should use contraception (on the theory that if you are going to have sex outside of marriage, at least don’t risk pregnancy or transmission of STDs). So the position of the Church is limited to saying that people should not have sex outside of marriage.
Additionally, I doubt that anyone wants pharmacists or insurance companies demanding to know the details of the private lives of people filling prescriptions.
Survey after survey finds that over 90% of Catholics of childbearing age use contraceptives. How hard is the Catholic Church working to get them to stop?
January 30th, 2012 | 8:04 pm
Sally, my guess is that it’s just conceded that there is no practical way to accomplish that. There is no way the current state of law would permit that kind of discrimination by either an insurance company or an employer. The current state of law does, OTOH, permit an employer to choose the type of insurance they offer to all of their employees without distinction, which is why the new mandate is deemed an unreasonable imposition.
January 31st, 2012 | 12:13 am
I always forget to say things I think are obvious. So for instance, there is a difference between tolerating the inevitability of sinful conduct and actively participaing in the sin of someone. I think the old penny catechism lists 9 ways that we can be guilty of the sins of others.
The ones I recall are – by provoking the sin, by being a partner in sin, by silence,by consent, by counsel. When a church inclludes in their compensation and benefits package the means to facilitate fornication, I would think they are complicit in that sin. They are communicating the message that this conduct is acceptable and that the church (or temple, mosque, etc) is fine with accomodating this behavior. This seems like something that contradicts the idea that religions are trying to help people to live a morally upright life.
If there are religious leaders or theologians from non-catholic faiths, I would be interested to know if their religious organizations are concerned with this problem, or whether there are some other reasons why in principle it is not a concern for them. Practical reasons aside shouldn’t religious organizations avoid participating in or encouraging sin through their employment policies? Or am i missing something?
January 31st, 2012 | 5:02 am
[...] Chait: HHS Mandate “Out of Whack” – Matthew Schmitz, First Things/First Thoughts [...]
January 31st, 2012 | 6:18 am
@sally: command, counsel, consent, concealment, participation, provocation, praise, silence, defense of the evil done.
January 31st, 2012 | 6:26 am
I think there is an important distinction between believing something to be a sin and not doing it.
The meme “Catholics don’t believe contraception is a sin; 90% of Catholics of child-bearing age admit to having used it” is deceptive because it’s like saying “Catholics don’t believe lying is a sin; 90% of Catholics admit to having told a lie.”
People do things they know are wrong. That’s what the Sacrament of Reconciliation is for. As long as someone acknowledges that the act is sinful and intends, or at least hopes, to stop doing it, he can not be considered to have rejected the Church’s teaching. I suspect the proportion of Catholics who truly reject the Church’s teaching on contraception (as opposed to just thinking it’s impossibly hard to follow all the time) is relatively small.
January 31st, 2012 | 8:31 am
sally rogers – ‘Contraception’ covers rather a large range. Condoms, spermicides, diaphragms, IUDs, oral contraceptives, implants like Norplant, etc.
Some have no utility beyond blocking or preventing conception (e.g. diaphragms, IUDs). Some prevent conception while also helping to prevent the spread of disease (condoms, and to a – much – lesser extent, spermicides).
Hormone-based contraceptives, however, can treat a number of other conditions (e.g. polycystic ovarian syndrome). In such a case, the contraceptive effect is a ‘side effect’. Such drugs are also sometimes used to help regulate irregular menstruation.
A flat ban on all contraceptives for unmarried persons would also wind up depriving some from obtaining (what seems to me, at least) to be legitimate medical treatment. It’s possible that some denominations leave it up to their congregants’ consciences.
January 31st, 2012 | 9:03 am
@sally: The news I’ve read says numerous religious organizations, and not just Christians let alone Catholics, have raised concerns here. Of course, there are also Christian denominations that would have no trouble with this mandate, e.g. the current Episcopalian leadership.
January 31st, 2012 | 10:10 am
Ray – I agree it might be awkward to limit the use of hormonal contraceptives to cases of treating disease, but that’s something I would think could be accomplished by requiring a diagnosis of an illness requiring a prescription.
There may be several kinds of practical problems with a policy of limiting contracetive coverage to married couples. But there are ways of adressing those problems and it’s worth it if you think the problem is serious enough. So, for instance Pentamom points to anti-discrimination policies. But there are all kinds of ways that businesses accomodate married couples that are permitted in the law, and if religious groups thought this was an important problem I would think this would be permitted.
And thanks Felapton for the others in that list of ways of sharing in the guilt of others. Those old fashioned catechisms can be helpful.
January 31st, 2012 | 10:48 am
A flat ban on all contraceptives for unmarried persons would also wind up depriving some from obtaining (what seems to me, at least) to be legitimate medical treatment
No, it wouldn’t, because it is customary to categorize drugs and procedures within a context that is capable of differentiating between Drug X prescribed for reason A vs. Drug X prescribed for reason B.
If our nation is going to get through the challenges we currently face, we are going to have to get serious about learning to distinguish needs from wants. It really isn’t that hard – insurance companies (and people with what used to be called common sense) have little difficulty distinguishing between what is necessary from what is merely pleasant.
(BTW are we actually talking about banning contraceptives? And what’s this about ‘unmarried’ persons? I must have missed something?)
January 31st, 2012 | 11:06 am
Blake my question concerns whether religious organizations have moral opposition to offering contraceptive coverage to their unmarried employees because it facilitates fornication and involves the religious organization in sinful conduct.
The Supreme Court has said that the 14th amendment does not permit states to ban contraceptives. It has not said that religious groups must pay for them. Yet.
January 31st, 2012 | 11:16 am
Blake –
Well, according to this article, that distinction isn’t always made by religious organizations.
True, I should have said ban “on coverage for“, good catch.
The closing question of first comment above?
February 1st, 2012 | 6:45 am
Well, according to this article, that distinction isn’t always made by religious organizations.
Got any sources that aren’t openly biased?
The NYTimes is as much a propaganda machine for the Left as Fox News is for the Right.
February 1st, 2012 | 6:50 am
Blake my question concerns whether religious organizations have moral opposition to offering contraceptive coverage to their unmarried employees because it facilitates fornication and involves the religious organization in sinful conduct.
The Supreme Court has said that the 14th amendment does not permit states to ban contraceptives. It has not said that religious groups must pay for them. Yet.
Nobody should be forced to pay for contraception because contraception isn’t medicine.
The whole idea of mandated health insurance is based on the idea that there is something unethical about a society letting its citizens die of treatable conditions. This urgency, this mandate, should only be used for legitimate and medically necessary conditions.
Furthermore, since resources are scarce (to the point where we already cannot cover all the needs that should be covered), we should prioritize what is and is not covered based on necessity – that is, urgency and importance.
It is unethical for a society to commandeer resources in the name of providing medical care, then squander those resources on frivolous and/or unnecessary things. It is unethical to be taking taxpayer money and using it to hand out free condoms with one hand, while we’re unplugging peoples’ dialysis (for lack of funds) on the other.
February 1st, 2012 | 12:06 pm
Blake –
Contrary to popular belief, ‘ad hominem’ is not Latin for “that’s mean!” – Isaac Rabinovitch
Blake here illustrates what ‘ad hominem’ actually means. (Well, ‘ad journal’, I suppose.)
February 1st, 2012 | 7:42 pm
Got any sources that aren’t openly biased?
Contrary to popular belief, ‘ad hominem’ is not Latin for “that’s mean!” – Isaac Rabinovitch
Blake here illustrates what ‘ad hominem’ actually means. (Well, ‘ad journal’, I suppose.)
Yes, it is true that I do not consider the NY Times reliable. They aren’t shy about their agenda, and they aren’t ashamed to quite openly slant their evidence, omit “the other side” of controversial debates, and they’ve even been caught fabricating evidence.
So, yes, if that one article is the sum total of your argument, then I don’t think that you have done enough to establish the claim you are making. And, given that the threat you perceive is not consistent with how insurers actually operate, I do think the burden is on you to establish a compelling case that forcing churches to cover contraception is necessary to prevent people from being denied legitimate non-contraceptive medical treatments. Radical claims require support.
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