The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has reaffirmed a rule that virtually all private health care plans must cover sterilization, abortifacients, and contraception beginning August 1, 2012. Non-profit religious employers that are not exempt under the rule’s extremely narrow definition of religious employer, will be given one year (until August 1, 2013) to comply. At that time, Catholic-run colleges, hospitals, charities and many primary schools would be required to provide such coverage.
Responding to the announcement, Archbishop Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, stated: “In effect, the president is saying we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences … To force Americans to choose between violating their consciences and forgoing their healthcare is literally unconscionable. . . It is as much an attack on access to health care as on religious freedom. Historically this represents a challenge and a compromise of our religious liberty.”
To learn more, and how you can send an email to Congress on this issue, please visit www.usccb.org/conscience.