Mea Culpas

WE UNDERSTAND, MSW ....... No problem, MSW. We realize how important your fellowship at the papally controlled Catholic University is. We by now don't expect you to read carefully polls that might be spun quickly to support the papal position. And I doubt many NCR readers noticed and/or cared that you played hookey yesterday. We look forward to your afternoon spin.

By the way, the correct journalistic heading is "IMPORTANT CORRECTION", not the elusive Latin "Mea Culpa".

Michael. I have the same angst as you about Polls. The problem comes about with the universal and the particular. Its so easy to ask a generic question and then assume the respondent means x,y,or z. The trouble is always in the details. The First Amendment creates a two way street. Its not a simple matter of government not inflicting itself on the religion it also is about the converse: religion inflicting itself on government. It is precisely the
appeal to the First Amendment which can cause a solution which the Bishops
will not be happy with. My parents always warned me that I might get what
I ask for and be very unhappy when it turned out not to be exactly what I wanted. This is very often the situation with being totally focussed on a specific outcome and losing awareness that something other may well arise.
We now have a conflict added into the argument. Conscience. Regardless of how
the legal problem works out the conscience problem cannot be resolved in favor of the Bishops stance. Aquinas adds to the idea of conscience the
aspect of personal responsibility and free will. Ironically it is our ability
to sin which merits us when we use our conscience. There is no conscience
without the individuals freedom to choose. We can indeed choose poorly in good conscience. Conscience cannot be mandated. This is what falsifies
the notion of the employers conscience overruling that of his individual employee. This is catholic doctrine. The constant harping on Abortion does
not help when for most of us its about birth control which most of us view as
essential to keeping population in a rational relationship to our earths resources. Our clergy are not at all competent in the area of science and mdeicine and our church history records only the flawed resistance to ideas
that did not please the hierarchy. But just as they are willing to accept that the earth is not the center of the universe they will eventually come around to more recent scientific trends. If we wish to have a church of the middle ages we can have it. It will be a smaller church and its devotees will
all be in lockstep. It will also die out. We have to have church that can cope with the present time. There is really no need for opposition the true
problem is the centralization of power which corrupts absolutely.
God Bless we all have many mea culpas.
TomC

"Do you believe that church-affiliated instititions have a First Amendment right to be exempt from government mandates that contradict their moral teachings?"

Ask the bald question and you will probably get a resounding and overwhelming "yes". But explain what that means concerning providing contraceptives in health insurance for employees of Catholic hospitals and I think you will get what we have now - people are somewhere in the middle. Great ideal - but doesn't work when it goes too far. The same confusion exists comparing polls about abortion - most people don't like it but most people don't want to make it illegal.

My schtick in this whole thing is to find a way that we can operate as Catholics inside a democracy comprised of people of all faiths and backgrounds. We have to find a way to operate in a world that is not a Catholic world. We have to join Hindu, Jew, Wiccan, Methodist, Baptist, Muslim, atheist, agnostic, evangelical and undecided fellow U.S. citizen and neighbors in creating what is "the common good." If we are to do that, we have to be willing to respect each other and to - here is the dirty word - compromise on public policy so each individual can make a personal decision according to her own conscience.

How do we compromise with "evil"? I don't know but maybe we have to look at it in terms of personal conscience, as TomC helps us understand it in his comments here. There is also an article by David Gibson of Religion News Service about formal, material, and remote cooperation here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-faith/bishops-contraception-ob...

ATF,
You are difficult to follow. The system as it currently stands does what you describe. If you want to end the life of your unborn baby nobody is stopping you. But the minute a minority of the poplulation decided for everyone else that healthcare is a "right" and will now mandate preventative services, you are crossing the line and imposing your beliefs on others who don't share your views and forcing them to pay for something they don't want. Why is this so difficult for people to understand?

Andrew K