5 Things You Should Know About Religion and Contraception [View all]

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http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2012/08/religion_contraception.html


Most Religious Americans Support Contraception




By Eleni Towns | August 1, 2012


A provision of the Affordable Care Act that requires health insurance plans to include coverage for a range of preventive health services for women with no co-pays goes into effect today, including important services such as annual well-woman visits, screenings for gestational diabetes and HIV, testing for HPV, and breastfeeding support. In addition, the law requires coverage for all FDA-approved contraceptive methods and family planning counseling for women at no additional cost.

The contraception provision exempts churches and other houses of worship with moral objections to birth control from providing coverage. What’s more, the Obama administration provided an accommodation to religiously affiliated organizations such as hospitals, universities, and charities that object to contraception, requiring insurance companies to provide contraceptive coverage directly to employees and students, removing the religiously affiliated organizations from the transaction.

Despite the exemption and accommodation, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and their conservative allies continue to voice their fierce opposition to the law’s contraceptive coverage provision. The bishops launched a multimillion-dollar public relations campaign that included their “Fortnight for Freedom” campaign aimed at persuading the public that the contraceptive coverage requirement in the Affordable Care Act violates religious freedom. In addition, the bishops and their allies filed more than 40 lawsuits against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, seeking to enjoin the regulation.

Religious liberty is a core American value—one we all treasure. But in this case, the cry of threatened religious liberty distorts the real issue, which is that the bishops and their allies are seeking to impose their doctrinal views on a diverse public that holds a variety of different views and beliefs, and they are trying to allow employers to use religion as an excuse to discriminate against their female employees. Ironically, it is their heavy-handed tactics that are threatening the religious liberty, as well as the equal rights, of others.


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