43 Catholic Groups File Suit Against Obamacare

The battle is on. The Catholic Church has thrown down the gauntlet in the front lawn of the White House.
The Archdiocese of New York, the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., the University of Notre Dame—43 Catholic dioceses and organizations nationwide in total—filed a dozen federal lawsuits against the Obama administration for violating their constitutionally guaranteed freedom of religion.
The Catholic dioceses and businesses are suing the Obama administration over new regulations that would force health-care plans in the United States to cover sterilizations and abortion drugs.
“By suing the Obama administration, they are sending a message that the freedom of religion guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution is essential to our liberties and that they will fight to preserve it,” says Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. “The Constitution guarantees more than simply freedom of worship. It also protects the right to live out one's religious beliefs in accordance with their faith.”
As Perkins sees it, regardless of their views on abortion or contraception, Americans of all faiths oppose forcing religious organizations to pay for such services. The Obama administration, through its Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), he argues, would do just that by forcing religious organizations to cover abortifacients and contraceptives in their health-care plans.
Alan Sears, Alliance Defense Fund president and CEO, also applauded the lawsuits. He says the lawsuits are about religious freedom and freedom of conscience, not about contraception, just as the archdioceses themselves are saying.
“These new cases are about the very right to determine what is ‘religious’ and what faith-based beliefs may be followed in life,” Sears says. “They join the growing list of evangelical, protestant and Catholic religious organizations and employers who are taking a stand in objecting to the government when it forces any religious institution or individual to provide or fund morally repugnant services.”

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