08 | October | 2009

Obama May 17, Notra Dame:

So let us work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions, let’s reduce unintended pregnancies. (Applause.) Let’s make adoption more available. (Applause.) Let’s provide care and support for women who do carry their children to term. (Applause.) Let’s honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded not only in sound science, but also in clear ethics, as well as respect for the equality of women.” Those are things we can do. (Applause.)

Rick Santorum has sent out this alert:

In his address at the University of Notre Dame, Obama talked a good game about respecting conscience on abortion rights. He did the same thing when he met the Pope. But that was all it was — talk.

The Obama Administration’s attack on Belmont Abbey College proves that.

Belmont Abbey College is a small, private, Catholic college located in North Carolina. For 130 years, it and the Benedictine monks who run it have been dedicated to handing on the Catholic faith.

But the Obama Administration is now trying to force them to abandon that faith or go out of business.

You see, the Administration at Belmont Abbey College removed contraception, abortion, and voluntary sterilization from its faculty’s health care policy after discovering it had accidentally been a part of existing plans.

Employees of the school who objected to this change in policy brought a complaint against the school accusing them of “gender discrimination.”

Ed Morrissey reports from there:

The president of a small Catholic college in North Carolina is in a standoff with the Obama administration’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) over demands that the school must offer contraception coverage in its employee health insurance. Belmont Abbey College President William K. Thierfelder says he will shut down his school before doing so, citing the Catholic Church’s prohibition on contraception and First Amendment religious liberty rights.

On September 10, the college retained the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty to appeal an August 5 ruling by the EEOC, charging the school with discrimination. In a letter to Thierfelder, the EEOC stated the college “is discriminating based on gender because only females take oral prescription contraceptives. By denying coverage, men are not affected, only women.” Thierfelder objected with a letter posted on the school’s website, saying: “Belmont Abbey College rejects the notion that by following the moral teachings of the Catholic Church we are discriminating against anyone.… We are simply and honestly exercising the freedom of religion that is protected by the Constitution.”

The Obama administration has promised to protect freedom of conscience in the health care bill, but if this case is any indication, it was just another empty promise from Obama, even as his ambassador to the Holy See promises the Pope, otherwise:

Miguel Diaz presented his credentials to Pope Benedict XVI this morning (Oct. 2) as President Barack Obama’s ambassador to the Holy See, and the new envoy drew a pledge of cooperation on international issues from the pope, as well as clear insistence upon “the inalienable right to life from the moment of conception to natural death,” as well as “the right to conscientious object on the part of health care workers, and indeed all citizens.”

The Obama administration’s actions against Belmont Abbey College doesn’t exactly square with what Obama told the Pope in their meeting at the Vatican last July, either:

VATICAN OBAMA

Obama told the pope he understands the church’s teachings and said, as he has before, that he would like to reduce the number of abortions in the United States, Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi told CNN.

It has been said that every Obama statement has an expiration date. This one was a rotten, rancid, maggot infested lie the minute it was said.

Gateway Pundit has more.

RELATED:

Catholic Bishops say change the health care bill or else!

In a letter just released, the three Catholic bishops leading the Church’s efforts on health care warned Congress that “we will have no choice but to oppose the bill” unless current bills are amended.

The letter signed by Bishop William Murphy, Cardinal Justin Rigali and Bishop John Wester outlines three main areas of concern: “that no one should be forced to pay for or participate in abortion, that health care should be affordable and available to the poor and vulnerable, and that the needs of legal immigrants should be met.”

PDF of the letter from the US Council of Catholic Bishops, here.

Breitbart:

House Republicans have failed for a third time to oust Rep. Charles Rangel as chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee.

Despite the expected defeat Wednesday, the GOP did keep the spotlight on the New York Democrat’s ethical problems, although the matter will be turned over to the House ethics committee for a long-term investigation. The House voted 246-153 to refer the resolution to remove him to that panel in a partisan vote that had no meaning except to revisit Rangel’s problems.