For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters;
only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for
self-indulgence, but through love become servants
to one another. For the whole law is summed up
in a single commandment,
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” - Galatians 5:13-14
About a week has passed since the Supreme Court of the United States delivered its ruling in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby. The Justices decided 5-4 in favor of Hobby Lobby. From my reading of the majority opinion in this case, three issues were clarified in this matter: 1) Hobby Lobby’s standing as a person under the law; 2) the applicability of the First Amendment to the Constitution; and 3) the government could not compel Hobby Lobby to adhere to the form for the contraceptive mandate prescribed by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed into law by the President on March 23, 2010. This law is probably the most controversial law I have ever encountered. No Republican voted for this legislation and 34 House Democrats voted against it. While it is controversial, I support health care reform. People should have access to affordable health care. However, this law is severely flawed. The law is purely secular. A purely secular law is, in itself, not a bad law. The Affordable Care Act has poorly written language and poorly advised mandates.
My own mother is poor and nearly disabled and still cannot get health insurance. The exchanges provided by the legislation are not universal in their scope, otherwise, my mother would have had insurance by now. The elected officials in Washington on both sides of the aisle have their witnesses for their own cases, for and against, the health care law. To reiterate, I am for health care reform that is comprehensive in its applicability and sensitive to the needs and beliefs of its patrons. The law is poorly written because the original implementation dates of many pieces of the law have been delayed by executive order, the law has been challenged in court by many entities, and the law itself will be a factor in the midterm 2014 elections. The special election for a House seat in Florida in early 2014 was seen as a referendum on the Affordable Care Act.
The Supreme Court decided that Hobby Lobby has personhood under the law. I have read many commentaries on news articles where readers have posted and ‘liked’ that corporations do not have opinions or beliefs because they are corporations. These are also the same readers who are vehemently condemning the ruling. The Court made its decision about Hobby Lobby’s personhood based on several prior rulings but what was interesting was the justices use of the government’s argument against Hobby Lobby. The government created an exemption for religious organizations in their argument affirmed the personhood and religious freedom of religious organizations but denied the personhood and religious freedom of what they termed non-religious organizations. The Court essentially upheld that Hobby Lobby had personhood under the law. Ironically, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, in the dissenting opinion, stated that the Court never ruled that a corporation has beliefs.
After Hobby Lobby’s personhood was upheld, the right to religious freedom was explored. The justices essentially upheld the First Amendment right to religious freedom and affirmed the application of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The commentaries on articles I have read often blast this court ruling as allowing an employer to force beliefs upon their employees. The language most used in the commentaries is that Christians are ‘shoving down our throats.’ The more liberal commentators note that the religious Christians are ‘extremists.’ I think it incredibly rich to refer to Christians in these manners when the media makes it a point to ignore the mass persecutions of Christians around the world. We are just now hearing about Christian persecutions in Iraq and Syria, but these have been taking place for years. In Nigeria, persecution was largely ignored until real extremists kidnapped young Christian girls. Christians are heavily persecuted in Indonesia and China. This case restores the right of the American entrepreneur to start and run a business with protected religious convictions. The United States was founded largely as a haven for religious freedom which is why the founding fathers codified this protection in the Bill of Rights of the Constitution of the United States.
The government could not prove that the Department of Health and Human Services had justification to compel Hobby Lobby to adhere to the contraception mandate. The majority opinion noted that the exemption already provided for religious organizations included means for people who were under the exemption could still acquire contraception rejected by their employers. The justices also explicitly stated that the government could provide the contraception as well.
The ruling reminds us all to reflect on our understanding of freedom. It is essential to continue to affirm the freedom of religion. It seems that the American landscape is in the midst of a time of constitutional skepticism. In the past two years I have seen controversies concerning freedom of the press (over revealing sources), freedom of religion (in the Hobby Lobby case and others), freedom of assembly (in the occupy movement), and second amendment gun rights. It seems to me that as we become more privacy oriented and self-oriented, these constitutional protections are becoming more abstract and protracted to suit political needs.
The Church has always taught of the sanctity of life from conception to natural death. In the papal encyclical, Humanae Vitae, by Pope Paul VI and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, promulgated by Pope John Paul II, the Church affirms the procreative and unitive nature of sex which is reserved for the husband and wife with the state of Holy Matrimony. It is for this reason that use of contraceptives for the intent to undermine the nature of sex is considered sinful. Pope Paul VI also states, “The Church, on the contrary, does not at all consider illicit the use of those therapeutic means truly necessary to cure diseases of the organism, even if an impediment to procreation, which may be foreseen, should result therefore, provided such impediment is not, for whatever motive, directly willed.” (HV, 15) This means that drugs used to treat other ailments but also act in a contraceptive manner are not sinful as long as the intent for use is not contraception.
A mandate providing for contraception is in direct contradiction of long held Church teaching. For this reason, Churches were given an exemption from the contraception mandate of the Affordable Care Act. This is an acknowledgement of the religious standing of the Churches and a nod to their fundamental rights under the First Amendment to the Constitution. The White House stated in response to the ruling that it would ‘jeopardize the health care for the women who work for Hobby Lobby.’ From the perspective of the Church, whose own rights have been acknowledged and protected, this is a great absurdity. Because if it were true that lack of contraception is a sincere risk to women’s health, then the government would have compelling reason to ensure that every woman not only has access, but also direct possession. But the law itself acknowledges that tens of millions of women do not have access to contraception as prescribed by the law. This is because the law exempts the mandate for companies with less than 50 employees as well as existing health care plans grandfathered by the law.
The 111th Congress of the United States did their job in passing the legislation for this Act. The President did his job in signing the Act into law. The Supreme Court of the United States did its job in upholding the individual mandate as a tax and, especially, in ruling for Hobby Lobby against the contraception mandate in the law. What I find most difficult from some of the American people is their aggressive rejection of the Court’s ruling. The Court was not capricious or political in their opinion. The majority opinion is very methodical and logical in its assessment and judgment. The rejection of this ruling by the White House administration contributes to undermining of the decision and the authority of the Supreme Court.
Perhaps most disappointing is either the apparent lack of education among many commentators and news writers or their disregard of the law or the opinion to advance a political agenda. Both of these actions are divisive and undermine the rule of law in America.
As Christians, we must rededicate ourselves to our faith. We must know our faith and we must be able to defend our faith. We must also know elementary civics and the basic freedoms and rights. God bless America, the land of the free and the home of the brave.
