Praise the Lord! It is only a battle in the war but it’s going in the right direction so far!
Tuesday evening, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor granted a last-ditch plea from Catholic groups to temporarily block mandatory birth control in the new health care law for religious organizations, just hours before it was to have gone into effect.
Sotomayor issued the stay at the request of an Order of Catholic Nuns in Colorado, the Little Sisters of the Poor Home for the Aged. They are part of a larger effort by Catholic-affiliated groups from around the nation to halt a provision of the Affordable Care Act that requires companies, regardless of religious beliefs, to provide contraceptives and other abortion-inducing drugs to their employees. The groups want the mandate halted while the court considers a legal challenge, brought by the for-profit company Hobby Lobby, arguing that the requirement violates their religious liberties.
Back in June, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver waived millions of dollars of fines against Hobby Lobby and a subsidiary, Mardel Christian Stores, which refused to comply with the mandate, writing that the companies were likely to win their claim that requiring for-profit companies to pay for birth control was a violation of religious protections. The motion for a stay went to Sotomayor as the justice with oversight for the 10th Circuit. She has given the government until Friday to respond.
“Tomorrow, a regulatory mandate will expose numerous Catholic organizations to draconian fines unless they abandon their religious convictions and take actions that facilitate access to abortion-inducing products, contraceptives, sterilization, and related education and counseling for their employees,” the groups said in their request for a stay Tuesday.
The Obama administration had crafted a compromise that attempted to create a buffer for religiously affiliated hospitals, universities and social service groups that oppose birth control. The law requires insurers or the health plan’s outside administrator to pay for birth control coverage and creates a way to reimburse them. But for that to work, the nuns would have to sign a form authorizing their insurance company to provide contraceptive coverage, which would still violate their beliefs, their lawyer Mark L. Rienzi said.
“Without an emergency injunction, Mother Provincial Loraine Marie Maguire has to decide between two courses of action: (a) sign and submit a self-certification form, thereby violating her religious beliefs; or (b) refuse to sign the form and pay ruinous fines,” he said.
