The Little Sisters of the Poor are making headlines once again. Their case against the coercive Obama contraceptive mandate is heading for the United States Supreme Court and all eyes are on the women who have chosen to follow God’s law, not Obama’s anti-Catholic mandate.
So what is this all about?
The Little Sisters of the Poor decided that they could not follow the Department of Health and Human Services’ contraceptive mandate because insurance coverage for contraceptive services including the pill violates the laws of the Catholic Church and their vows. Based on that decision, in September 2013 they filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court asking that they be exempted from having to follow a mandate they see as unethical and oppressive.
Following on the heels of this lawsuit, the National Catholic Register reported on the statement and the insights of Mark Rienzi, senior counsel for the Becket Fund, the firm representing the sisters in the case, and stated, “The outcome of their case will not only affect the order, however. Because the Little Sisters’ legal challenge is part of a class-action suit, a future ruling will also determine whether the Christian Brothers Employee Benefits Trust and Christian Brother Services, among other religious nonprofits, will be shielded from the mandate.”
Thus the battle was engaged and now it is time for the United States Supreme Court to weigh in and deliver a decision on this case—a case that represents in a multitude of ways the serious problems that confront people of faith when the government gets involved in pandering to the demands of the contraceptive cartel in America.
Planned Parenthood Federation of America has led the cheering section of the culture of death on matters pertaining to the Obama contraceptive mandate. Cecile Richards, president of the organization, has said that the mandate makes it impossible for a woman’s boss to decide whether or not her contraceptive pills will be covered by her employee health insurance. Richards claims, “Birth control is a basic and essential component of women’s preventive health care. Women have been fighting for access to birth control for decades, and this is a historic advance for both health care and equality.”
And therein lies the problem. Why have women been fighting for decades to have someone else pay for their birth control? The answer is that for those women, who are hell-bent on using the dangerous chemicals, pregnancy is the enemy and chastity is not on their list of preferred behaviors.
Such women neither understand nor want to know how the pill works and what threats it may pose to their health and well-being. They see or believe, from the propaganda they have been exposed to, the contraceptive pill as a panacea that provides the sexual freedom they think is the pathway to happiness.
So now all eyes will be on the Supreme Court, and the hope is that the court will see the logic in the case brought by the Little Sisters of the Poor. Pope Francis is surely behind their plea for justice, even taking time during his recent trip to the United States to make a surprise visit so that he could speak with them.
It is clear that the Little Sisters of the Poor are already heroines to anyone who believes that the U. S. government has really overstepped its bounds in this case, not to mention the broader question of being handmaids to the culture of death!
To quote Sister Loraine Marie Maguire, provincial of the Little Sisters of the Poor, “All we ask is that our rights not be taken away. The government exempts large corporations, small businesses, and other religious ministries from what they are imposing on us—we just want to keep serving the elderly poor as we have always done for 175 years. We look forward to the Supreme Court hearing our case, and pray for God’s protection of our ministry.”
Amen, Sister.
We stand with you against a draconian government that has acted time and again against the laws of God by pandering to Planned Parenthood and its ilk. Enough already!