Equivalence or Equivocation?
Over at NCR, Michael Sean Winters praises Notre Dame President John Jenkins for the letter (pdf) he sent on Wednesday to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in which he claims that new mandates for the coverage of contraception would put the University and other religious institutions in “an impossible position.” Jenkins says:
“This would compel Notre Dame to either pay for contraception and sterilization in violation of the church’s moral teaching, or to discontinue our employee and student health care plans in violation of the church’s social teaching. It is an impossible position.”
Winters is impressed by this line of reasoning, writing:
“Father Jenkins makes a point that had not previously occurred to me – or to anyone else whose writings on this topic I have seen. It is just as morally objectionable to stop providing health care coverage as it is to provide coverage for procedures we find morally objectionable.”
He then goes on to ask why the Obama administration would allow Planned Parenthood and others to pressure it into putting such good friends in such a moral and, apparently, logical quagmire. But, are these two things, the Church’s moral teaching and its social teaching really in direct contradiction? Is making contraception available to individuals acting on their conscience who choose to take advantage of such services ”just as“ objectionable as denying healthcare access to an entire workforce?
There seems to be a deep equivocation here, which is common among religious opponents of health care reform, between allowing individuals to choose to engage in actions that we find morally questionable and social or corporate participation in such actions. Providing access to morally questionable procedures merely creates the space for individuals to act freely, but denying access to health care would be a morally questionable act perpetrated by the institution. Thus, the claim that health care mandates ensuring access to medical procedures forces Catholic institutions to choose between participating in two different but equally immoral actions doesn’t wash. The provision of access is not the same thing as active participation.
There is a second and, in some ways, more interesting issue that Jenkins raises in his letter. Jenkins claims that the narrowing of the government’s religious exemption implies that Notre Dame is “less religious” for serving students and employing faculty and staff who are not Catholic. Jenkins writes:
“According to the proposed definition, only those organizations that ‘primarily serve persons who share its religious tenants’ count as religious employers. Although our Catholic convictions inspire and motivate the educational mission of Notre Dame – and inform us about what we cannot ethically do – we nevertheless serve many others who do not share our Catholic faith. As Cardinal Keeler said of the Catholic schools in his diocese, many of which serve the poorest neighborhoods: ‘We do not educate our students because they are Catholic; we educate them because we are Catholic.’ We believe that an institution inspired by faith to serve beyond the limits of its religious denomination should not be judged less religious, and hence less worthy of exemption.”
Here, Jenkins’ seems to be challenging the Obama administration on the grounds that it is infringing upon Notre Dame’s religious freedom, by presuming to define what counts as a “religious institution.” This is how law professor Carter Snead described the controversy in today’s edition of Notre Dame’s student newspaper, The Observer, saying, “[The Obama administration] had a very, very narrow religious conscience exemption. You wouldn’t require the Holy Cross priests to cover contraception for the brothers [but] any entity that is not a church itself is not exempt from the mandate. [...] It’s about religious freedom, it’s not about contraception.”
However, if it is the case that we educate non-Catholics because “we are Catholic,” this seems to be, in part, because as Catholics we recognize and respect the religious freedom of our students as well as our non-Catholic colleagues. For all the conservative bluster about “freedom,” many conservatives fail to recognize that providing access to health care is about making it possible for individuals to make necessary decisions with regard to their heath care in consultation with their doctors and consciences free from the fear of financial burden. Aside from a more liberal interpretation of this freedom as simply creating the opportunity for individuals to choose, many of the poor populations that, as Jenkins points out, are served by Catholic schools are the most adversely affected by the financial burdens that a lack of access to certain health care options, including contraception, creates. If “we” are committed to the religious freedom of our students and colleagues it stands to reason that we would provide them with the opportunity to make medical choices in accordance with their own consciences.
Secondly, regarding the question of identity, it seems strange to claim that qualifying for a religious exemption as defined by the government would make one more or less religious. Indeed, it seems strange to correlate degrees of religiosity with one’s stance on particular public policy decisions at all. This suggests that religious believers and practicioners could not have good religious reasons for allowing for freedom of conscience in such matters.
Furthermore, defining churches and religious universities differently by law doesn’t entail a judgment with respect to their relative degrees of religiosity. Presumably, Jenkins would admit that the Catholic University of Notre Dame is not a Catholic parish, at least insofar as its faculty, staff, and students do not play the same roles as the clergy, staff, and congregations that gather for worship and catechesis. These different roles, of course, involve different commitments on the part of the employees and different goals with respect to what is on offer for those being served. At the same time, however, no one would want to say that this difference in mission implies a different level of “religiosity,” rather it simply highlights the fact that churches and universities pursue slightly different ends and that this requires different considerations, legal and otherwise, with regard to the means by which such ends are pursued, including what can reasonably be expected of the institutions that support such pursuits.
Of course, I am only presuming that Jenkins would admit the difference between a Catholic parish and a Catholic university. If Jenkins reads the old statute for religious exemption as applying to an institution that “shares common religious bonds and convictions with a church” in the strong sense that his protest seems to imply, this would, at the very least, require a serious revision of Notre Dame’s policies regarding the commitments of its students and faculty, which would push it, as Gary Caruso wrote in today’s Observer, “towards seminary status and away from an open university.” Certainly, it is entirely up to the administration of Notre Dame whether it wants to take such steps, but until it does, it only breeds confusion among faculty and students as to what is expected of them as they pursue their studies. As the student editor’s of the Observer point out, Jenkins’ rejection of the recommendations of the “Institute of Medicine,” the board of experts charged with adjudicating which measures should be deemed medically basic for inclusion in the health care provision, stands in contradiction with a “Jenkins administration that has vociferously supported scientific research.” In light of these reflections, it seems that whatever “impossible position” Notre Dame claims has been forced upon it, the equivocation that Jenkins has introduced between the mission of the university and the mission of seminaries and parishes and between the moral status of contributing to freedom of choice in health care and denying any health care choices whatsoever, arguably leaves the members of the Notre Dame community even more befuddled and, what is worse, hampers the kind of inquiry that is ostensibly the very raison d’etre of the university.
In sum, just as the provision of access is not the same thing as active participation in the health care decisions of individuals, qualifying for legally defined religious exemption is not the same thing as being religious. “We” Catholics need not fear being defined out of our faith by the government nor need we fear sacrificing our religious freedom to the freedom of others, rather we should see that every expansion of freedom, moral and intellectual, contributes to creating the very possibility of faith as a gift that is truly un-conditional and auto-nomous. This to say that the “greatest” faith exists where there is nothing that can keep us from the love of God, which is always without condition and completely self-legislating. Or, to put it in the words of former Notre Dame Executive Vice President, Fr. Edmund P. Joyce, which adorn the base of a statue of he and Fr. Theodore Hesburgh that stands outside the Notre Dame library, “Notre Dame is first and foremost a university and only insofar as it excels as a university can it give proper homage to the patroness who bears as one of her noble titles, Seat of Wisdom.”
The USCCB has formed a committe headed by bishop Lori to protect the “civil rights of our people” from the ‘assault” upon them.
this fits in.
Of course it includes the NY gay marriage law too -see the threads below.
To what degree will people listen?
Is the exception in the proposed regulations similar to the ones that the highest courts of California and New York upheld against constitutional challenges by diocesan Catholic Charities organizations?
I haven’t looked at it in detail but it appears to me to be similar to the test used in California, which was upheld.
I am tired of these arguments, but for me, the simplest bottom line position is that employer provided health insurance is a form of compensation. Notre Dame, presumably, does not have its employees sign a pledge not to use their after tax income to purchase contraception even though it comes directly from Notre Dame. Notre Dame could just pay its employees more, but the reality is that it would have to pay them A LOT more to put them in the same position to purchase insurance on their own that would leave them with the same after tax income — that is how hard it is to purchase individual insurance and how favorable the tax treatment of employer provided insurance is.
There is a third option of closing down Catholic institutions.
To me, this whole controversy provides another reason why a single payer system would be preferable to burdening employers with being nannies to their employees.
The provision of access is not the same thing as active participation
____________
And being forced to pay for something is not the same as mere “provision of access,” it is being financially involved.
But even apart from the matter of Catholic teaching, why should any non-religious person or institution be compelled to subsidize the sex lives of other people?
One cannot say on the one hand that sex is a purely private affair, and then at the same time demand that the public finance it. Notre Dame should be perfectly free to stay out of people’s bedrooms, including staying out via the pocketbook.
And before anyone comes back with the usual snarky rejoinder — no, they shouldn’t be subsidizing Viagra either.
Bender, paying them a salary subsidizes their sex lives, their purchase of porn, and yes, their political and charitable contributions to candidates and causes you vehemently disagree with. Just because you have a clearer idea of who is doing what with how much doesn’t make it a subsidy. Employer provided insurance isn’t a subsidy unless the employees aren’t actually working to earn it. It’s income.
“…providing access to health care is about making it possible for individuals to make necessary decisions with regard to their heath care in consultation with their doctors and consciences free from the fear of financial burden.”
Free from the fear of financial burden? Seriously? Please let me know in what multiverse that obtains, because I’d like to be transported there.
Eric,
“Is making contraception available to individuals acting on their conscience”–actually that is the whole question in a nutshell. Whether anyone likes it or not, it is the normative teaching that artificial contraception and sterilization are immoral. If an individual takes a job at a Catholic institution, this individual should knows what h/she is signing on to. Although I am no expert on hiring at ND, it doesn’t seem to be that the university is lacking for qualified candidates to teach.
Given your standard, there is no reason why ND or any other Catholic university should not offer healthcare plans that pay for abortions. That is what one would logically deduce from this statement: “If “we” are committed to the religious freedom of our students and colleagues it stands to reason that we would provide them with the opportunity to make medical choices in accordance with their own consciences.”
AA
Many institutions do not offer a health plan that include dental work, and we don’t think that that the institution is discriminating against anyone — it offers it to no one. Why should it be illegal for other institutions to offer other limited health plans e.g., no abortions?
Again, the government is telling the Catholics what to do even though in similar cases it would be unthinkable for it to tell others what to do. It surely doesn’t tell a surgical clinic that it must provide abortions services, does it? Why can’t the Catholic hospitals limit what they offer without having to answer for their decisions? So long as their employes are told up front what their insurance will and will not cover, I don’t think they any gripe coming.
Ann,
Makes a lot of sense to me. But then again, sometimes being a Catholic means saying “No” and that leaves some people in these precincts feeling uneasy.
There are times to be countercultural, ladies and gentlemen. Sometimes we define our identity by setting limits.
AA
AA –
I don’t’ think the basic issue here should be defined as the Catholic hospitals saying No, no. It should be defined by the nuns rights to say “Yes, yes, we will offer these services to the community at a cut=rate cost”. That anyone should thing the government has a right to tell them
“Thanks, and now you have to add th abortion service whether you want to or not”.
This is NOT a conservative position on my part, it’s a liberal one. I think it is outrageous to tell a generous person that he or she must be even more generous. It’s a violation of their individual rights to give benefits to whom we choose and to choose what those benefits are. Next the government will be telling us which charities we have to support.
This is not analogous to a restaurant serving customers and refusing to serve some people. This is a case of an eleemosynary institution offering benefits at less than ordinary costs for free. By crushing down the institution they are also depriving the citizens to get care of a quality they might not otherwise be able to get, if they can get it at all.
Sorry that some of that is incoherent, but I think you get my point: the government has no right to tell me whom I will choose to serve. I just get very angry at this sort of governmental infringement on individual liberties. What is so outrageous is that it is often so-called “liberals” who are insisting on such infringements.
Don’t be afraid of the word “No.” It can be a very beautiful, spirit-filled word.
“If an individual takes a job at a Catholic institution, this individual should know what he/she is signing on to.”
Anthony Andreass,
One can also say the same with regard to Brigham Young University (Mormon), Wheaton College (Evangelical Protestant), and Yeshiva University (Jewish).
When religious institutions say “no” to things that they regard as wrong and evil, they are simply attempting to state what their faith traditions and values are worth to them. It has to do with merit, excellence, faith, character, integrity, importance, account, etc. Possibly, and to a degree, Fr. Jenkins is more in line with Jonathan Edwards’ concept of freedom: “True freedom consists only in the power of doing what we ought to will, and in not being constrained to do what we ought not to will.” Within these limits, there can be freedom for all. The US, for example, can’t yield to actons that present a clear and present danger to democracy (i.e., allow guns without regulations, allow non-citizens voting rights, suspend the writ of habeas corpus to citizens, etc.); nor can it enact a questionable course of action for the consecution of power within the state. There are always limits to American freedom. There are always boundaries, checks, restraints, bounds, confines, etc. for the common good (or for what the state deems the common good).
Freedom of choice is not worth anything that is not under the law, the law’s prohibitions. If religious institutions believe certain things are evil to promote or advance on campus, they should not be forced to do so.
It is my understanding that Jenkins is considering denying health insurance to his student employees because of this clause on contraception/sterilization. The greater harm would be to deny an employee health care coverage rather than allowing freedom of conscience for him/her to exercise that clause or not. Is Jenkins playing “God” with the health and welfare of his students?
What Denise wrote. The onus is on the employee to follow her conscience. Or is Jenkins against the primacy of conscience. Notre Dame just pays for the health care. The employee chooses what to use.
I imagine what’s happening here – and in other recent federal regulatory actions – is that a strongly secular Administration has decided to tighten up in favor of a secular model in areas in which religious institutions and governments interface. That is, if there’s a choice to be made, it will be made in favor of the secular model, denying any benefit to religion.
I’d guess this is just the nose of the camel under the tent – that we’ll see much more of it in the future. If that’s the case, it may well be that Catholic universities and hospitals will be forced to contract or close. Church universities are already suffering from a laicisation of faculty, which has inevitably led to a dilution of their religious character, and the same thing’s bound to happen to Catholic hospitals.
Some of these “contraceptions” are in fact abortifacents. A Catholic institution cannot allow its insurance plan which it offers to its employees access to things such as this. This is far too close to formal cooperation. Paying someone a salary and then if he or she uses that money for immoral acts is a very different thing.
Enabling others to choose sin is the antithesis of love and charity. Freedom of conscience is not the highest ideal, avoiding sin is. If Notre Dame can help people do so, they should.
Abthony Andreass is exactly right. Bugyis’ argument would also support requiring Notre Dame to offer health insurance to pay for abortion. The Catholic position is the one ably articulated by Fr. Jenkins.
While I’m grateful for our tradition of careful and comprehensive moral reasoning, at certain points (and this is one for me) I just have to (figuratively) throw my hands up and say, “Enough!”.
Really? Are US Catholic college presidents (and bishops and other hierarchs) really going to go to the mat over contraception? When 95% or more of adult Catholics disagree with and/or ignore the Church’s teaching on contraception? Can’t we go back to the days (or did they never exist) when clerics quietly pretended to take the Church’s teachings on sexuality seriously and the rest of us quietly pretended to listen?
In my view President Jenkins would better serve his university and his church by focusing on more immediate and pressing moral issues confronting American higher education in general and Notre Dame in particular: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/10/the-shame-of-college-sports/8643/ I’m sure Taylor Branch would be willing to speak at Notre Dame about how the church can use its moral authority as a force for good in the wider society. http://taylorbranch.com/king-era-trilogy/parting-the-waters/
Luke,
It is not actually just about contraception. Gone are the days when we were just talking about the “pill” and condoms. More and more forms of “contraception” today do not simply prevent fertilization but actually destroy the fertilized egg.
AA
@Anthony Andreass (10/1, 9:42 am) Thanks for the response. I’m aware of that. Alas, it doesn’t seem Fr. Jenkins is making even that distinction. (Not to mention that finer distinctions to be drawn about contraceptives the prevent/deter implantation of the fertilized egg in the uterus…which happens, if I recall correctly, in about 50% of the cases in which no contraceptives are used anyway.
Again, it feels like we’re approaching “how many angels on the head of a pin” territory. It’s fine to have cloistered monks and ivory tower academics musing about such abstruse points of theology. But, in my view, best to keep it there and not end up arguing for special exemptions for South Bend’s largest employer that would have the added consequence of giving the university a cost advantage over its secular competitors.
Agree with Luke on this one. There are bigger issues with respect to the character of Catholic schools vis a vis sports, dollars, income generated from the fighting Irish slogan and how that revenue translates into alleviating the inequity that exists within the United States and which is getting far worse. Catholic institutions need to be part of the solution and not complicit in the problem.
As an aside,
Sounds good but the problem is that private Catholic schools can (and from what I understand do) opt not to accept a student with severe behavioural problems, low chances of advancement, and other issues whereas the public system is publicly mandated to provide education to these students.
The ability to be able to self-select due to private school status is going to lead to better outcomes than other school systems. But that is another discussion.
George,
Do you realize that Catholic schools “expel” less than 1% of students? I know personally of a Catholic elementary school which DID NOT expel a 7th grader who brought an unloaded gun to school. Rather, the school worked with the family and he successfully graduated 2 years later. So, please. Don’t tell me that Catholic schools exclude the students with behavior problem or learning disabilities. I am the president of the board of an inner-city Catholic school in brooklyn that educates children of all backgrounds and learning abilities. Most Catholic schools DO NOT self-select. But, you are right on this: that is another issue
More and more forms of “contraception” today do not simply prevent fertilization but actually destroy the fertilized egg.
Anthony Andreass,
You are talking, no doubt, about the hypothesis that oral contraceptives sometimes interfere with implantation. I personally would not call that destroying the fertilized egg. In any case, a great many pro-lifers make the claim that the pill is an abortifacient, but there is no conclusive proof of this.
There is an article on the web site of the Association of Prolife Physicians the conclusion of which is as follows:
I think many pro-lifers, particularly Catholic pro-lifers, are motivated (perhaps unconsciously) to promote the idea that oral contraceptives are abortifacients because they sense (rightly) that arguing against them as contraceptives is not as effective as they would like it to be. We find somewhat the same phenomenon when it comes to condoms. It is not enough to argue that using condoms for contraception is immoral. It must also be argued that they don’t work, or even if they do work when used correctly and consistently, people tend not to use them correctly and consistently. The most extreme case I can think of is that of Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, who when president of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for the Family, said in a television interview that the AIDS virus could easily pass through latex condoms. This was an outrageously false statement, and the World Health Organization had to correct it.
For some people, when opposing contraception, if the truth isn’t powerful enough, it’s seen as necessary to go beyond it.
I really don’t see why it is not enough for Catholic institutions, if required to provide insurance to employees that covers contraception and sterilization, to make a strong statement to the employees about the Catholic position on such things and let it go at that.
” If “we” are committed to the religious freedom of our students and colleagues it stands to reason that we would provide them with the opportunity to make medical choices in accordance with their own consciences.”
The phrase “it stands to reason” does no such thing. Such declarations only *mention* reason, they do not appeal to it.
If you’re going to make the blanket claim that a school ought to provide the means for its student to follow their consciences, you could just as easily claim that if a student from the backwoods wants to buy some snakes for a religious snake ritual (that endangers his life) the school should provide him with the snakes to do it. That, after all, is what the kid’s conscience requires him to do.
No serious person would ever claim that commitment to religious freedom requires us to collude with everyone in everything their consciences tell them to do. If that were so, we would hare to help Mohammad Atta buy his plane tickets if he needed the money.
Doesn’t the famous fungibility issue work the other way here? If Notre Dame supplies health insurance that excludes condoms, they’re still making money available for people to buy condoms because they don’t have to pay for xrays.
This all seems silly to me. Why should the supplier of health insurance feel morally responsible for any possible decision made by their insured employees? By this logic, shouldn’t Notre Dame stop hiring non-Catholics, because of all the sinful choices non-Catholics make with their salary dollars?
Are there no procedures paid for by Medicare or Medicaid that trouble Catholic consciences? Our tax dollars already pay for them. (Not to mention all the bullets I’ve paid for over the years so the US government could kill people I don’t approve of killing).
@Anthony Andreass (10/1, 10:35 am) I know this is off topic—and I’m grateful for the work you and your school (and similar Catholic schools) do—but as far as I know, it’s pretty well documented that, in general, Catholic (and other parochial and private) schools tend to have a lower percentage of students with learning disabilities (and in particular, severe learning disabilities) than do public schools.
Thanks again, Eric, for another incisive and provocative piece. In assessing Mr. Jenkins approach, it may be helpful to factor “history” into any assessment. Mr. Jenkins must still be reeling from the Roman pressure that must have surrounded his having Mr. Obama speak at ND. Just look at how Theological Studies was just hammered over a five year old article……………….. It seems clear, with the presidential election coming, that the Roman clique and its US branch managers and apologists (including Messrs. Dolan, Chaput, Lori, Donahue, Weigel, et al.) have begun an all-out counter-attack on Mr. Obama. The attack is also intended to distract Catholics from the Roman clique’s disgraceful failure to take effective measures to stop child rape by clerics. Shamefully, neither Mr. Dolan, as head of the US Bishops, nor Mr. Chaput ( Messrs. Rigali and Bevilaqua’s successor in Philly), have yet to comment meaningfully on the Philly abuse scandal and the Rolling Stone article covered so perceptively in your “Eichmann in Philly” Commonweal article ………………. Moreover, on the matter of contraception, noting even briefly the history of the manipulation of the “theology” purportedly underpinning this dangerous doctrine is essential for understanding the current conflict. Coincidentally, NCR has just picked up a recent statement by an actual Vatican II participant that sheds some more light on this crucial history, and is further amplified by an informative comment from Little Bear , that prophetic voice who constantly keeps us all honest on matters of church history and doctrine. The relevant NCR article is accessible at http://ncronline.org/blogs/ncr-today/vatican-ii-eye-witness-speaks-out ………………………… As with many of the important challenges confronting our Church, Mr. Jenkins is facing the irreconcilable conflict faced by all Catholic colleges–witnessing and pursuing the truth honestly, while trying to placate a Roman ideological clique that hammers alternative voices at will, most recently, Elizabeth Johnson. Eric, you studied theology at Yale, so you must know what free space really is like. ………………….The overbearing overhang of Roman pressure on Catholic colleges was brought home to me recently by some of the comments to your excellent “Putinization” article, accessible by clicking on to http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/blog/?p=15277 . Your ND colleague seemed to rush in to the Hans Kung pile-up to point out that few ND graduate students cite Hans Kung these days, although another commentator from secular Berkeley had a different experience. Your ND colleague’s gratuitous comment evoked some memorable replies by some wiser guides like Joseph O’Leary and Len Swidler, but especially by Bill Mazzella’s apt reminder of “damnatio memoriae”. Interestingly, Hans Kung was taught at the Gregorian in the early ’50′s that there are some essential authors that Catholic scholars must read, but don’t dare cite. Fortunately, Hans Kung rejected this unprincipled advice, which may be why at 83 years old, he is still by far the most widely read living Catholic theologian. You may find it somewhat amusing as a Kant scholar, Eric, but when your esteemed colleague, Richard McBrien, studied in Rome in the ’60′s, ecclesiatical permission was formally required to read the “heretic” Kant’s work!……………….. I am still trying to understand the motives for Adam de Ville’s outrageous and inaccurate blast at Hans Kung. So far, it appears to me that he may have been aiming more at promoting his new book and endearing himself to the Roman clique. He could not have read many of Hans Kung’s valuable contributions and scrupulously have made the rash statements he made. Again, fortunately, those who have read much of Hans Kung’s work weighed in for balance. …. P.S. My use of “Mr.” with respect to clerics is not intended to be disrespectful. Neither Jesus nor his apostles used fancy titles and I don’t think any of the Roman clique or their US branch managers has, so far at least, claimed to rank higher than Jesus. Some of them appear to have come close to doing so. But who knows what the New Evangelization will bring?
1. Unless I am mistaken, at least part of the reason that this issue arises at a place like ND is that ND is the recipient of federal funds for things like research, etc.
2. A prediction that I hope turns out to be wrong: As Bob Nunz mentions above, the USCCB has announced a major initiative to fight for a robust conscience clause. It is hiring staff members and has appointed a bishop to chair the initiative. See NCR for important details of the letter that Archbishop Dolan wrote to announce this initiative. My prediction: This initiative will figure prominently in the USCCB’s pronouncements that bear upon the 2012 national elections.
I hope that my prrediction is wrong. Given the recent history of USCCB interventions into political issues, I’m not at all sanguine about how all this will turn out.
Dear Mr. Slevin,
Maybe the New Evangelization will bring an end to rambling diatribes against anyone who exercises even the slightest amount of authority in the Church? But I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Sincerely,
The Reverend Anthony Andreassi, C.O., Ph.D.
“…to make a strong statement to the employees about the Catholic position and let it go at that.”
But the government should not make “the position of the school,” its Mission Statement, the cause of a barrier (or of indifference) between the school and its employees (and/or students). Nor should the government (through it policies) attempt to make the Statement neutrally interpretive (i.e., neither here nor there). After all, what is the point of the Misson Statement if not to lay out honestly the religious motives and self-imposed aims of the school, its trustees and its sponsoring religious order (or denomination).
Religious institutions hope employees and students will create the religious taste by which a school is savored and appreciated. Ultimately, the Mission Statement of the school’a trustees and employees should be understood in common with one another — especially in regard to morality. However, if that commonality or purpose is lost, then the Mission Statement becomes merely a polemicized void, a joke.
David N. (11:26am) –
Forty years of institutional experience at doing what you suggest shows unquestionably that there is “the Catholic position” and the position of the vast majority of active Catholics. No connection. The bishops’ and associates’ decades-long record helps explain why they now seek help from civil law and regulations to impose what they can not within the processes of the Church. That non-Catholics may be caught up in their efforts seems incidental and, furthermore, regrettable, given an asserted commitment to religious freedom.
Extending employer-provided group health insurance beyond an important part of one’s compensation for work done to include employee morality discriminants requires far more careful thought about what members of the university family, Catholic, not just others, may possibly do on their own time. Consider the insurance coverage, paid for jointly by the university and all the insured, for gluttony-induced heart attacks, sexually transmitted diseases, fetal alcohol syndrome caused by the insured, and DUI injuries. Luke Hill (10/1 9:38am) was right. It’s time to go back to “let’s pretend” as in earlier days until Church leaders and followers get on the same road, if ever.
Unless I’m mistaken, Jesus didn’t blog either.
There are so many murky issues involved in and implied by Fr. Jenkins statement that I don’t think one thread can even begin to handle them all meaningfully at the same time. They include –
1. necessity to conform to Church teaching
2. material cooperation with evil
3. contraception
4. just wages
5. academic freedom
6. how to find out what Catholic teaching really is
7. exactly what is Church teaching on all these issues
7. who is really Catholic
I pass.
Ann is absolutely right that this post calls to mind all the issues she lists. What bothers me about the murky trip into contraception that Fr. Jenkins takes yet again, is the potential it has to leave innocent people without health insurance. What would you do if suddenly your insurance was no longer? I would avidly be looking for another job. To put his employees through a possible scenerio such as this shows a lack of compassion. I favor compassion and the alternative which is trusting an adult to make an adult decision. No matter how some spin this issue, contraception is not abortion. Those who in good conscience practice contraception do not choose proceedures in any way related to abortion. They are not the same issue.
Denise –
I do wonder whether the issue is whether or not the employees will have health care supplied by the university. I suspec.t it is only whether or not the insurance offered will cover contraception, abortion, etc. If those things were dropped from the university’s health care plan the employees could buy the contraceptives for themselves not a huge outlay compared to having to by single payer insurance. So I doubt that the problem for the employees is as drastic as is being made out to be.
Ann–I hope you are correct and that I am misunderstanding. Thank you for that possible clarification!
Luke, you can’t keep backing up forever. There will be a point, before long, at which even you will be obliged to choose between the Church and the secular state. I wonder what the issue will be for you.
He uses noms de net.
Ann, is “murkiness” a good enough reason not to take action? Maybe I misunderstand your point.
If the Obama administration is trying to force Catholic institutions to compromise, is that an acceptable use of power?
“…will be obliged to choose between the Church and the secular state.”
David Smith,
And Washington — at some point — will also have to realize that in ALL things it can’t take the place of Mt. Sinai as it were (or of any holy mountain) for some secular, utilitarian level plane. An institution like Notre Dame (or Wheaton or Yeshiva or Brigham Young) has its own compelling moral signature and ought not become a repository of government policies alien to that moral stamp or mark. Some insurance policies will always be morally coded at such schools. No utilitarian government policy should try wrench those schools away from their standards.
Should Loma Linda Hospital (Jehovah’s Witness) be able to exclude the cost of blood transfusions from its employer provided health benefits? Should 7th Day Adventist, Mormons and Muslim organizations be able to exclude the cost of alcohol and substance abuse rehabilitation benefits?
What seems especially pathetic is that it is transparently obvious to anyone who bothers to examine the issue that most Catholics are no closer to the official position on contraception than most non-Catholics.
ND doesn’t have to provide benefits at all. It could pay employees to purchase insurance. For a variety of governmental policy reasons it is far more expedient and cheap for ND to provide group coverage. They aren’t there for ND’s explicit benefit, nonetheless, ND is the beneficiary of those policies — to a certain extent, like the Amish and the payment of SS, you can’t always pick exactly which government policy options you would like to participate in.
Second, in 2014, when the exchanges go into place, the platform really will exist for the migration from employer provided benefits to one’s chosen by the individual, with money from whatever combination of sources is available. That will make this issue go away entirely. It will also make a lot of other issues go away with employer provided insurance but I doubt if those are of day to day concern here.
Some educated guesses about recent trends among Catholics attuned to politico-religious themes:
1) Almost all of those opposed to Notre Dame giving Obama an honorary degree support the Jenkins letter.
2) Of those who favored Notre Dame giving Obama an honorary degree, about half support the Jenkins letter and half oppose it.
3) Of those who oppose the Jenkins letter, almost all favored Notre Dame giving Obama an honorary degree.
4) Members of Group # 3 disproportionately agree with recent characterizations of the Catholic Church as Mafia-like, Putinized, peopled by Eichmanns, homophobes, equivocators and miserable hypocrites such as Scalia, and in dire need of a new Luther.
5) As the Obama dream fades, and with it the Biden-Sebelius-Pelosi version of Catholicism, the Left increasingly engages in negative criticism, replacing the Hope and Change message
6) Likewise the religious left no longer clings to the hope of winning Catholics as the swing vote to keep Obama in power and turns increasingly negative toward the unenlightened, thus producing the diatribes of #4.
I concede there are numerous inidvidual exceptions to these generalizations, and this is by no means an exhaustive list of categories (many people don’t fall in any of these groups). And this grouping says nothing about the merits of any controversy. To repeat, they’re just educated guesses, We won’t know for sure until the trends have passed.
Thanks Patrick, Anthony, Grant and Ann for your direct or indirect reference to my “diatribe”. But deflecting my comments by burying them in some sociological list or sarcastically referring to Jesus as a non-blogger is a reaction, not a response. I could care less about Obama or Scalia. They also went to Harvard Law and know well what they are doing and pursue their own agendas, which differ from mine. What I care about, and think more Catholics should care more about, is the evil that our Church has done to innocent children and the need to reform our Church to make sure this evil is stopped once and for all. The pedantic hairsplitting that too often fills the space of Catholic blogs has its place, I suppose, but the Church is really in crisis and I encourage thoughtful Catholics to focus diligently on finding and executing solutions. The hierarchy spends many millions of publicist dollars to push its viewpoint on all matters. As Paul showed us, a little diatribe may be appropriate at times. Aquinas, in his discussion of fraternal correction and citing Matt 18:15 and Augustine, argues forcefully that the faithful have a clear obligation to speak out against prelates who do evil (see “Question 33, Secunda Secundae of the Summa Theologica). There is some truth to Anthony’s “rambling” insult and Ann is certainly correct and astute that Mr. Jenkins’ position involves many discrete, but fundamental, issues. Unfortunately, many of these issues are often avoided by Catholic bloggers. They appear to be too “hot” to handle. Well they must be handled, or things will just get worse. Murphy’s Law! It is all of our Church and we can and should all let our voices be heard. The unspeakable sacrificing of children, by lay and clerics, left and right, compels us all to demand and work for reform. I tried last year to propose some action and, not surprisingly, got no response. Please click on to my Washington Post proposal based on Raymond Schroth’s idea for an independent commission at http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/guestvoices/2010/04/pope_should_endorse_independent_investigation.html If at least some of my proposals were given a hearing, the pope might have avoided the ignominy of being cited in a criminal complaint filed with the International Criminal Court. The hierarchy, in my view, has taken far too long in adopting meaningful protections for children. Until the hierarchy does more than speak platitudes, I intend to do what I can to protect children, whether or not hierarchs or some Catholic elites approve. I am surely not Paul, Augustine or Aquinas. But I don’t have to be. We are today all subject to the rule of law and I do know something about how that works. Thanks for at least reading my comments.
Dear Mr Slevin, Esq.
Might you be able to explain to me how this thread became about the sex abuse crisis? Or do you count yourself among the group here who will high jack most any topic to bring it back to that? While the sexual abuse of children is unspeakable crime, there are other issues of concern in our world and Church also.
Thank you.
Father Andreassi
(While you follow anti-clericalist tact in refusing to grant honorific titles to priests such as “Father,” I being more old-fashioned still cling on to the the last vestiges of clerical privilege. It is a weakness, I know, but given other clerical vices, I hope forgivable.)
@David Smith (10/1, 11:04 pm) Luke, you can’t keep backing up forever. There will be a point, before long, at which even you will be obliged to choose between the Church and the secular state. I wonder what the issue will be for you.
Thanks for your concern. Just for the record, there are numerous small decisions I’ve made over the years where I’ve chosen between church and state on a number of issues.
While I appreciate that “you can’t keep backing up forever” (indeed, I agree!), one of the points I was trying to make is that choosing to “make a stand” on an issue on which 95% of your followers disagree with you and/or don’t care what you think isn’t a good issue to dig your heels in on.
(It’s not just the questionable theology and the almost laughably poor logic behind the Church’s teaching on contraception that’s aggravating. It’s also (and I agree this is a far less lofty level) the “small p” political boneheadedness of actions like Fr. Jenkins’ letter that’s both aggravating and baffling.)
Thank you, Anthony, for acknowleging the vice of clerical tiltles. I am foregoing using them henceforth. They pay tribute to a medieval ecclesiology that I think no longer meets the current requirements of the Gospels, if it ever did. I accept that titles work for you. From what I have read, you are associated with Regis High School, a fine schoo,l where my deceased brother attended during the early’50′s. Yes, a fine school but from what I have recently read, one that has had its own problems, so I realize I don’t need to preach to you. The recent Regis report especially disappointed me, because I have fond memories of discussing in the early ’80′s in my dining room with Jim DiGiacomo, a fine man, related issues, so I found the Regis story surprising…………………………. As to my high jacking, you are half-right. I did discuss the Roman clique’s manipulative and harmful approach to contraception, which is clearly germane to Mr Jenkins’s current position. Beyond that, since Commonweal presents much less discussion of the child abuse crisis then I think warranted, segways may be the only way to get Commonweal readers to focus on this uncomfortable, but urgent, subject. Judging by your and others’ reactions. it clearly causes discomfort. A search, for example, of the Commonweal Magazine database of the term, “International Criminal Court”, does not result in a single reference to the complaint filed recently against the Roman clique. Of course, the Commonweal powers that be may think the complaint is “trumped up” (it isn’t) or that it will be quickly dismissed (it won’t be). Nevertheless, it is a newsworthy event that Commonweal should analyze, pro or con, for its readers. Sticking one’s blog’s head in the sand, is hardly constructive. ………………….Given that type of slanted topic control , one must expect some “hijacking’ in the cause of free discussion. Your purist view on “staying on point’ really surprises me, since I regularly find comments that are all over the lot. I sense that my diversion was less objectionable because it was a diversion, rather the objection was more about the uncomfortable subject I diverted to. Here, Eric’s earlier prophetic comments about “banality” seem relevant. Thought police really have no place on a blog devoted, purportedly at least, to open discussion. If you don’t like what I write and are uninterested in dialoging, then please do both of us a favor and just skip over it. …………………..Anyway, I was pleased to read about the fine work you are doing for the poor in downtown Brooklyn. I went to Bishop Loughlin with Rudy Guiliani in your neighborhhood and have some fond memories thereof. No need to call me “Esq.”, Anthony, Jerry is just fine. Finally, I am not anti-clerical. I am pro-Gospel, which is different. If you are interested, John Allen thoroughly discusses at NCR the ICC complaint from the pope’s perspective accessible by clicking on http://ncronline.org/blogs/all-things-catholic/blessing-vatican-really-deep-disguise .You might also note my comment under John’s article entitled ,”POPE IN HANDCUFFS?” . As you likely know, NCR frequently goes where Commonweal fears to tread.
Just a point of information for me, would Jenkins (or a hypothetical person in a similar situation) object to insurance convering the birth control pill if it were to be used for regulation of a woman’s cycle? To the best of my knowledge, this is considered morally licity by the church. If it would be ok, wouldn’t this render the whole conversation moot, unless we expect places like ND or their insurance companies to police exactly why a particular medication was prescribed by a doctor? This is obviously not the case for sterilization, but simply saying we won’t cover the pill seems to place an undue burden on women who may use it for purposes deemed licit by the church.
Andy Beuchel,
You raise a very interesting point. It is very likely that the health plan at ND and other Catholic institutions is already paying for contraceptives for employees and their spouses who require them for medical reasons. The contraceptive effect of the medication is still in effect and so they are indirectly, or unintentionally permitting the health plan to pay for contraception as well. Now we need a moralist to explain how they get around the moral cooperation issue in these cases.
Jerry –
I suspect the blog has all but talked itself dry aboutf the scandal. Over some years there are many previous threads about it, including one reaching over 500 posts. I’ve forgotten the name of the thread, but msybe somebody can enlighten you. You’ll find all sorts of opinions there.
Mr. Slevin,
Thanks to your cyber-sleuthing, my provenance has been uncovered. Touche.
You might try a bit of humor. It goes a long way. And that’s why I read Commonweal and have never subscribed to NCR, though it does, at times, produce some interesting stories. On the whole I find the crowd there take themselves far too seriously and their reporting is far too dour.
You say International Criminal Court? I say sovereign immunity! Ha!
Afftly,
AA
Oh, and Happy Respect Life Sunday. :)
Thank you so much, AA, and you also have a Happy Respect Life Sunday–which I assume includes children after they are born, as well before they are born. I have a great sense of humor, thank you, but being Brooklyn born, don’t take slurs like “anti clericalism” lightly. Incidentally, as to your childish “Ha”, the sovereign immunity defense is unavailable in the International Criminal Court. That is why the ICC was established so that sovereigns, like the current Roman monarch, cannot evade justice as he has so often with his soverign immunity defense in various national courts. I , for myself, am ending this discussion. It must really be distracting to other bloggers. I just hope I have made my point that I welcome dialogue, but am not going to let “cheap shots” pass.
Ending the discussion now? How sad. It was just getting fun.
See you when I see you
Thank you, Ann, for your reply. I was aware that over the past decade Commonweal has had threads about priest rape of children. Is this a subject, like fads in theology, that get dated? I do not expect 24/7 coverage, but the abuse problem is still with us. It appears clear that the tone-deaf hierarchy is banking on Catholics getting sick of talking about the subject. I am sick of talking about it! But I am sicker about the continuation of abuse and the duplicitous way the hierarchy and politicians continue to deal with the problem. Commonweal doesn’t need to have daily banner headlines, but some acknowlegement of continuing developments, when called for, is appropriate. The absence of appropriate reporting on the complaint recently filed with the International Criminal Court is noteworthy, so I noted it. Eric’s allusion to banality is relevant here. Neither Eric nor I believe the abuse crisis has reached Holocaust proportions. But the apathy of Catholics, nevertheless, has parallels to WWII German apathy. In fairness to German civilians, they faced execution if they spoke out. Catholics don’t. At worst, they don’t get any more Christmas cards from bishops and they may hear a few “Enough already!” refrains from other Catholics. Thanks for you many wise comments.
“Notre Dame is first and foremost a Catholic University….”
Nancy D.,
Well said, Nancy! Simply put, Fr. Jenkins believes that sterilizations, condoms, etc. should not be part of a healthcare package on a Catholic campus. No moral discovery is meant here (with different forms of intention)! He is simply stating this to the limit of its application, grounded on Catholic principle. Better to be poisoned in one’s blood than in one’s principles (as the saying goes), even though centuries occur in the meantime between premises and God’s ultimate settlement.
Luke Hill 10/02/2011 – 1:44 pm :
Well, of course, contraception is only one issue on the table at the moment. The ministerial exception thing looks as though it might have interesting consequences. Lay employees are iffy, I agree, but if the government’s inclined to throw the clerics out with the lay bathwater – and that could easily happen, with, maybe, one civil-rights complaint – this could get sticky.
It may be that Catholic hospitals in this country will soon be on life support, and Catholic universities are, as I understand it, increasingly indistinguishable from non-Catholic ones. Perhaps the Church in this country – if not throughout the West – is on its way to being reduced to a relative handful of priests and religious and amorphous crowds of free-thinking faithful.
Maybe, come to think of it, you will be able to keep backing up forever :O)
One wonders what combination of circumstances, short of naked compulsion, would have motivated Kathleen Sebelius, a member of the Catholic Church, to propose a reasonable religious-employer definition. I can’t think of a reason for supposing that there are are any such circumstances. I’m just sorry she is so intent on fulfilling the exceedingly low expectations the Catholic Right has for her as Secretary.
“I really don’t see why it is not enough for Catholic institutions, if required to provide insurance to employees that covers contraception and sterilization, to make a strong statement to the employees about the Catholic position on such things and let it go at that.”
I don’t see why Notre Dame couldn’t simply exit the business of providing health care insurance to its employees and students. In another year or two, the insurance exchanges should be up and running. Perhaps some enterprising insurance provider could tailor an exchange-sold package for such prospective customers. In addition, there are new rules already in effect that stipulate that parents can cover children on their plans up to age 26 – surely the vast majority of Notre Dame students would qualify. The university can pass some of the savings along to its employees in the form of higher wages. Or they can add a few more rows at the top of the football stadium.
Jerry: You obviously don’t read this blog very often. The sexual-abuse scandal is one of the most-covered subjects on dotCommonweal.
Thanks, Grant. I stand by my earlier comments. The pope gets sued for crimes against humanity and it is a non-event here. Instead, we get to read about popcorn!
Btw, Anthony R Picarello, Jr and Michael F Moses, the General Counsel and Associate General Counsel respectively for the USCCB, have filed some lengthy and detailed comments with the HHS regarding the interim regulations. It appears that there are broad avenues for legal challenges to the rules.
http://www.usccb.org/about/general-counsel/rulemaking/upload/comments-to-hhs-on-preventive-services-2011-08-2.pdf
The Catholic Health Association, which famously disagreed with the bishops on passage of the health care legislation, and thereby played a critical role in its passage, is in accord with the bishops on the question of how conscience protection should be interpreted.
http://ncrnews.org/documents/employerexceptionrelativetopreventiveservices9-22-11final.pdf
Three points worth noting:
(1) It’s nice to see the two organizations in agreement on this topic
(2) Of the several major reasons that the USCCB opposed the health care legislation, inadequate conscience protections were at or near the very top of the list. And it appears that, on this point, *the bishops may well have been correct*. This is an extremely important point for Catholic citizens and voters who seek to understand whether or not the Obama Administration is friendly to Catholics and Catholic concerns. On the question of pro-life protections in the health care legislation, the Obama Administration has issued an executive order to bolster those protections, and has intervened in at least one instance (with Commonwealth of Pennsylvania) to enforce that order. This is good news for Catholics (and, if I may say so frankly, a pleasant surprise). But in the second major area of concern to Catholics, conscience protection, the Obama Administration is acting in a way that is clearly detrimental to the Catholic Church. If we give the administration plaudits for its anti-abortion executive order, we must also hold it responsible for its anti-Catholic implementation of conscience protection. (And it really is galling that a prominent Catholic in the Obama Administration, Secretary Sebelius, is responsible for that implementation).
(3) This development calls into question CHA’s endorsement of the legislation. It would be bitterly ironic if the same legislation which may well not have passed without the CHA’s intervention turns out to prevent CHA members from pursuing their Catholic missions.