Opinion

LETTER: Religious freedoms are at stake

Published: Thursday, February 16, 2012

Dear Editor:

I have been involved in pro-life work since 1970 and am a practicing Catholic. I have watched during these many years our civil and moral rights slowly being usurped by our government.

Now we have President Obama instituting a mandate that is the most arrogant and overreaching assault on our religious liberties that we have ever seen. Employers of religiously based institutions (hospitals, schools, etc.) are expected to put their long-held beliefs aside and pay for procedures that run counter to the very tenets of their religion.

The so-called subsequent compromise would shift the responsibility to the insurance companies and taxpayers (many of whom share those same religious beliefs) are expected to pay for these services.

Cardinal-elect Timothy Dolan and many other church leaders have spoken out against this egregious infringement on our religious freedoms: “It is the place of the church, not the government, to define its religious identify and ministry.”

We in New York are all too familiar with this type of overreach. We have been forced to pay with our tax dollars for Medicaid abortions for many years. The New York State Right to Life Committee has long been lobbying our Legislature to rescind this bill.

I call upon American Catholics to speak out against this threat to our religious liberties. Our leader, Cardinal-elect Dolan, has said, “We remain fully committed to the defense of our religious liberty and we strongly protest the violation of our freedom of religion that has not been addressed.”

Call or write to your elective representatives now.

We must continue to oppose the underlying government mandate for or promotion of contraception, sterilization, or abortion inducing drugs. We cannot be apathetic when our religious freedoms are at stake under the guise of “women’s health services.”

Enough is enough! Continued...