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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I'm hoping American Catholics will leave the
Vatican behind and embrace progress and decency (which has always been in short
supply in the Roman Catholic political machine). The Vatican and the Catholic
bishops are so intent on CYA, power, "tradition", and control that it has lost
its moral compass---sanctioning nuns, covering up pedophiles, etc. ad
naseum.....</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Debi R-S</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=art.deco.studios@gmail.com
href="mailto:art.deco.studios@gmail.com">Art Deco</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=vision2020@moscow.com
href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com">vision2020@moscow.com</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Thursday, July 05, 2012 9:13
PM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> [Vision2020] Op-ed: The Growing
Abuse of 'Religious Freedom'</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV class=content>
<H1>Op-ed: The Growing Abuse of 'Religious Freedom'</H1>
<DIV class=node-teaser>The executive director of New Ways Ministry argues that
Catholic bishops are disguising bigotry as religion. </DIV>
<H4 class=clearfix><SPAN class=author>BY Frank DeBernardo</SPAN></H4>
<H3>July 05 2012 4:00 AM ET </H3>
<DIV class=body>
<P>The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has worked fiercely to
deny LGBT rights, and now it’s using the banner of religious freedom to
provide political cover for antigay positions. Although we hope any voices
that still prefer discrimination over equality will be drowned out soon
enough, the bishops’ campaign is more than just background noise.</P>
<P>The Catholic hierarchy is trying to fundamentally change the legal
understanding of individual liberties, weighting the supposed rights of
religious institutions more heavily than individual rights. At New Ways
Ministry, we think there are good secular and religious arguments for not
twisting the law into a tool for discrimination. Last fall, the Catholic
bishops created the Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty to protect against
a host of alleged threats, with five of the six predictably having to do with
sexuality. The committee opposes same-sex marriage and endorses “ministerial
privilege,” which sets different employment standards for religious groups,
allowing discrimination that is illegal for other employers. In addition,
religious institutions should not have to cover contraception in employee
health plans; Catholic charities should continue to be awarded federal funds
to serve victims of human trafficking while refusing to provide a full range
of reproductive services; and international HIV prevention programs should not
require condom distribution.</P>
<P>None of these positions are in line with the beliefs of Catholics in the
United States, placing the bishops well outside the mainstream.</P>
<P>But bitter experience has shown that once an unjust policy is set, it can
be difficult for our legal system to set it right. The bishops are attempting
to create the idea that the First Amendment is really a blank check for
religious institutions to do what they like with public funds, when in reality
these time-tested protections are for the individual’s freedom to worship, and
freedom from religion. This strategy exploits the guarantees of basic freedoms
for the purposes of discrimination. But the bishops’ lobby is known for
precisely this kind of surreptitious move — playing on Americans’ reluctance
to be told they are standing in the way of “Catholics’” (read: the bishops’)
religious freedom. The bishops have convinced some lawmakers that the majority
of Catholics need and want the assurance that others’ freedom to marry or use
contraception be denied for religious reasons.</P>
<P>American Catholics understand and accept the respect for individual
conscience, which includes the respect for others’ right to follow their own
conscience, even if the bishops don’t. A 2011 Public Religion Research
Institute poll found that Catholics are more supportive of same-sex unions
than any other Christian denomination or Americans overall. But there are
already some worrisome precedents set in the name of all Catholics, among them
Catholic Charities’ choice to give up its foster care and adoption services in
the District of Columbia and Illinois rather than allow same-sex couples to
adopt or same-sex partners of employees to have health insurance. When a
Missouri music teacher was recently fired by the diocese for merely discussing
his plan to wed his male partner, it was exactly the sort of employer
discrimination the bishops are fighting to protect.</P>
<P>The LGBT community has suffered under the law, both by discriminatory
statutes and from a lack of recognition for dimensions of our lives that don’t
fit within existing legal norms. But our faith in the law and our respect for
religious differences are what have many of us invested in the painstaking
process of nurturing good, rights-affirming policies while uprooting
injustice. Our fundamental objection to the bishops’ religious freedom
campaign is that it’s a misuse of the law — an attempt to create new rights
for religious institutions while trampling on the rights long-guaranteed to
all individuals.</P>
<P>The Fortnight for Freedom, a series of public actions organized by the
bishops to highlight their religious liberty crusade, will coincide with Pride
parades around the country. LGBT people in some states have more reason to
celebrate than others, and it’s heartening that President Obama has come out
in favor of marriage equality. Policy makers can’t just stop with the
endorsement of same-sex marriage, however. They need to affirm that “freedom”
still means the freedom for individuals to live according to their conscience,
not the freedom of religious groups to redefine the law.</P>
<P> </P>
<P><EM>FRANK DeBERNARDO is executive director of New Ways Ministry. Learn more
at the group’s website, <A
href="http://www.newwaysministry.org">www.newwaysministry.org</A>. New Ways
Ministry is part of the Coalition of Liberty and Justice — a broad alliance of
faith-based, secular, and other organizations that works to ensure public
policy protects the religious liberty of individuals of all faiths and no
faith and to oppose public policies that impose one religious viewpoint on
all.</EM></P></DIV></DIV><BR clear=all><BR>-- <BR>Art Deco (Wayne A.
Fox)<BR><A href="mailto:art.deco.studios@gmail.com"
target=_blank>art.deco.studios@gmail.com</A><BR><BR><IMG
src="http://users.moscow.com/waf/WP%20Fox%2001.jpg"><BR><BR>
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