AT WHAT POINT SHOULD A CHURCH ENTER THE POLITICAL THICKET?

   

    The Catholic Church has sued the Obama Administration. Bishop Daniel Jenky

of Peoria explains why:

    'We all know that our religious freedom is under direct attack as articulated

    in the federal government's Health and Human Services Mandate. ... “The

    mandate forces Catholic schools, universities, hospitals, and charitable groups

    to provide insurance coverage of abortion-inducing drugs, contraceptives and
   
    sterilization. This is directly contrary to our Catholic mission and violates our

    religious freedom.''


    But if the Obama Administration is truly directly attacking the “religious freedom”

of Catholics and the Catholic Church, why isn’t the church calling upon its membership

to “dump” President Obama in the fall election. If killing fetuses is truly a grave moral wrong,

why “pussy foot.” Why merely suggest that Catholics should “vote their consciences?” Why not

come right out and call for the President’s defeat? I suggest there are two reason.

   
    Father Michael Schaab of St. Pius Parish in Rock Island gives the first reason:

    “People always are concerned and leery that the church doesn't get into

    situations in which it looks as if they're being told how to vote. But the Bishop

    has been clear that's not the intent,''


    But if the church really believes abortion is tantamount to murder, why isn’t that “the

intent?” What’s the purpose of having a church if it won’t forcefully speak out against

what it perceives to be the equivalent of murder?


    So why doesn’t the church come right out and say, “If you truly believe that

abortion is a grave moral wrong, you can’t vote for President Obama in the fall? Indeed,

prior to 1954 the Churches were not so circumspect.


    On the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) website, you will find the following, which I

suspect is the real reason for the church “pulling its punches.”


    “In 1954, Congress approved an amendment by Sen. Lyndon Johnson to

     prohibit 501(c)(3) organizations, which includes ... churches, from engaging

    in any political campaign activity. [O]ver the years, it has in fact strengthened

     the ban. The most recent change came in 1987 when Congress amended the

    language to clarify that the prohibition also applies to statements opposing

    candidates.

    “Currently, the law prohibits political campaign activity ...  churches by

    defining a 501(c)(3) organization as one "which does not participate in,

    or intervene in (including the publishing or distributing of statements),

    any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate

    or public office."

    So, the question is this: Does the church have a realistic fear that if that if it descends into

the “political thicket,” that it will lose its tax exempt status? You decide. That same web site also

states

    “For the 2006 election cycle, the IRS received 237 referrals and

    selected 100 (44 churches, 56 nonchurches) for examination. More
   
    than half of these cases are still under investigation. However, the

    IRS did substantiate improper political activity in 26 cases and issued

    written advisories. So far, there are no revocation recommendations.



   But why does the IRS’s conduct not violate the First Amendment. That amendment

states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the

free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech ...”


    If a President raised a campaign war fund of a billion dollars with the promise he would

repeal the 13th Amendment and re-enslave all blacks, wouldn’t the churches, as a free exercise

of their religion and speech, have a right to denounce him and encourage the election of his

opponent? What if the President called for the extermination of all Jews, Catholics and Baptists,

or the suppression of all religions, wouldn’t the churches have the right to compare him to

Hitler and Stalin, and call upon their congregations to make sure he was not re-elected?


    There is a Constitutional reason that the churches are not taxed. Chief Justice John

Marshall long ago said “the power to tax is the power to destroy.” In 1970, in Walz v. Tax

Commissioner, Mr. Chief Justice Burger wrote

    “The legislative purpose of a property tax exemption is neither the advancement

    nor the inhibition of religion; it is neither sponsorship nor hostility. ...


    “Granting tax exemptions to churches necessarily operates to afford an

    indirect economic benefit ..., but yet a lesser involvement than taxing them.


     The exemption creates only a minimal and remote involvement between

    church and state and far less than taxation of churches. It restricts the fiscal

    relationship between church and state, and tends to complement and reinforce

    the desired separation insulating each from the other.”


    For the 2006 election cycle, the IRS investigated 100 churches, and found 26 violations.

It revoked no tax exemptions. Why? Because the IRS has to know that to do so would violate

First Amendment (free exercise of religion and free speech) rights, and would be

unconstitutional. No rule is better settled than that the First Amendment exists first and foremost

to guarantee political speech. Where true political speech is involved, “no law” means “no law.”


    In the much maligned (by liberals) 2009 case of Citizens United v. Fed. Election Comm.

the court said bluntly:

        “We find no basis for the proposition that, in the context of
   
         political speech, the Government may impose restrictions
   
        on certain disfavored speakers. Both history and logic
   
        lead us to this conclusion.”


  The “disfavored speakers” who brought the Citizens United case were corporations who wished

to use their “general treasury funds to make independent expenditures for speech

 (“electioneering communication”) ... expressly advocating the defeat of a candidate.” The Court

stated, “the Court has recognized that First Amendment protection extends to corporations.” Most

churches are corporations. And if under Citizens United, they can expend funds to advocate the

“election or defeat of a candidate, they certainly can engage in pure speech to advocate the

“defeat” of a candidate.


   But even if the churches would have to sacrifice their tax exemptions to condemn grave

moral wrongs, shouldn’t they do so?  If they fail to speak out in the face of who and what they

perceive to grave evil, who needs them?

Posted Online: July 17, 2012, 7:21 a. m.  - Quad-Cities Online

by John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2012, John Donald O'Shea 

   




  

Kumbaya or Confrontation? The 1st Amendment Question!

If Jefferson Davis II were running for president on a platform of reimposing slavery, would a black minister have a right to tell his congregation to vote against Jeff Davis II?

If Adolf Hitler Jr. were running for president, promising to exterminate all Jews, could a Rabbi lawfully urge his congregation to vote against Hitler Jr.?

On April 14, Bishop Daniel Jenky of Peoria, delivered an unusually forceful "anti-abortion" homily entitled, "A Call to Catholic Men of Faith."

Bishop Jenky accused the Obama administration of serious violations of religious liberty. Those who disagree with what he said have demanded his resignation from the University of Notre Dame Board of Fellows. Others have asked the IRS to revoke the dioceses' tax exemption.

Here are excerpts from that homily:

"For 2,000 years the enemies of Christ have certainly tried their best. But ... the Church survived...

"The Church will survive the entrenched corruption and sheer incompetence of our Illinois state government, and even the calculated disdain of the President of the United States, his appointed bureaucrats in HHS, and of the current majority of the federal Senate.

"We can no longer be Catholics by accident, but instead be Catholics by conviction.

"In the late 19th century, Bismarck waged his 'Kulturkampf,' ... against the Roman Catholic Church, closing down every Catholic school and hospital, convent and monastery in Imperial Germany.

"Hitler and Stalin, at their better moments, would just barely tolerate some churches remaining open, but would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services, and health care.

"In clear violation of our First Amendment rights, Barack Obama -- with his radical, pro abortion and extreme secularist agenda, now seems intent on following a similar path.

"[T]his is not a war where any believing Catholic may remain neutral.

"This fall, every practicing Catholic must vote, and must vote their Catholic consciences, or by the following fall our Catholic schools, our Catholic hospitals, our Catholic Newman Centers, all our public ministries -- only excepting our church buildings -- could easily be shut down.

Because no Catholic institution, under any circumstance, can ever cooperate with the intrinsic evil of killing innocent human life in the womb."

Whether you think Bishop Jenky right or wrong on abortion, there can be no argument that killing a human fetus raises a moral and religious issue. For 3,000 years Jews and Christians accepted "Thou shall not kill" as God's Commandment. There is no question but that applies to all humans from the minute of their birth. The only issue is whether it also applies to the unborn.

It is historically and religiously the function of a bishop to teach and preach. Christ told his disciples, "to make disciples of all nations ... teaching them "

Teaching has been the bishops' distinctive function for 2,000 years. It was the bishops' office when the Constitution was adopted, and the Bill of Rights approved. Our Founding Father recognized that.

When a bishop sees what he perceives to be a serious violation of God's law, he has a First Amendment right to believe that what he perceives is an "enormous evil." As a teacher, he has a second First Amendment religious right to engage in the free exercise of his religion, plus a third First Amendment right (free speech) to speak to convince others to oppose the "wrong" and/or wrongdoer.

The fact that a man is a bishop doesn't deprive him of First Amendment rights of freedom of belief, or free exercise of his religion. Nor does it mean that he surrenders his right of free speech. Whether he speaks in church, on a street corner, in a Catholic newspaper or on television, he still has the same First Amendment rights. (He is not advocating a breech of the peace.)

The First Amendment exists to give Americans -- including bishops -- the right to convince fellow Americans that any politician is evil, unworthy to be elected, re-elected, etc.

IRS regulations that abridge Bishop Jenky's rights to freedom of religion and speech are unconstitutional.

The reason churches are tax exempt is because the "power to tax is the power to destroy" -- or control.

If churches can be prevented from speaking out on moral issues, or against politicians they perceive to have taken immoral positions on issues, such as extermination of Jews, killing the unborn, or "putting down" the retarded or the elderly, you have destroyed freedom of religion, as well as freedom of speech. Removal of a tax exemption is in essence a tax.

If Planned Parenthood has a right to speak for abortion, a church has a right to speak against it. If "pro-choice" individuals and corporations have a right to support the election of "pro-choice" politicians, Bishop Jenky and religious corporations have a right to oppose "pro-choice" politicians, and to call for the election of "pro-life" politicians.

That is what the Citizen's United case is all about, and why it was correctly decided. Without this right, you get the sort of church leaders who temporized as million Jews were murdered.

So, where do you stand? For Kumbaya or confrontation? What exactly does "Freedom of Religion" mean?

Is a priest to be limited to saying Mass inside his church? A minister, limited to reading scriptures from his pulpit? Kumbaya or confrontation? The 1st Amendment question!

Posted Online: May 01, 2012, 3:24 pm - Quad-Cities Online

by John Donald O'Shea
Copyright 2012, John Donald O'Shea

Catholic Bishops Should Have Known My Mom

Two of my mother's most-used cautions were, "Birds of a feather, flock together," and "fools rush in where angels fear to tread." It was her way of warning me to avoid certain companions and certain situations.

To get Affordable Health Care, the Catholic Bishops ignored both of my mother's cautions (Part I, today). But on the issue, of Freedom of Conscience, they are right (Part II, tomorow).

Many Americans didn't vote for President Obama. Many looked at the Rev. Wright and saw a minister seething with hatred and calling for the damnation of the United States. They were not persuaded that Mr. Obama was unaware of the content of Rev. Wright's rants. Then too, there was Mr. Obama's relationship with the now "respectable" William Ayers, who co-founded the Weather Underground, a self-described revolutionary and terrorist involved in a campaign of bombing public buildings during the 1960s and 1970s. And his position on abortion was there for all to see.

But many Americans looked beyond those relationships and voted for Mr. Obama. Many were Catholics who knew, or should have known, of Mr. Obama's positions on contraception and abortion. That includes some members of the Catholic clergy.

In his presidential campaign literature, candidate Obama hid nothing. Mr. Obama stated that he had stood up for women's choice throughout his entire time in the Senate and that he understood that there would be those who disagreed with his positions. He further stated that he believed abortion is a moral choice which no woman makes lightly, but that each individual woman is capable of making that decision on their own.

At an event sponsored by Planned Parenthood in June of 2008, Senator Obama re-affirmed his pro-choice views.

"I have stood up for the freedom of choice in the United States Senate, and I stand by my votes against the confirmations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito. With one more vacancy on the court, we could be looking at a majority hostile to a woman's right to choose for the first time since Roe vs Wade, and that is what is at stake in this election."

President Obama spoke openly about abortion position. Nevertheless, President Obama captured 53 percent of the Catholic vote.

Once elected Mr. Obama embarked upon an all-out effort to enact Affordable Health Care legislation (Nation Health Insurance), with an "individual mandate" (a law which requires individuals to purchase health insurance and threatens punishment for those who don't). The United States Council of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) actively supported President Obama's Nation Health Care legislation. Indeed on June 2, 2009, in an Action Alert, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops called upon Catholics to help reform health care.

"In our Catholic tradition, health care is a basic human right. Access to health care should not depend on where a person works, how much a family earns, or where a person lives. Instead, every person, created in the image and likeness of God, has a right to life and to those things necessary to sustain life, including affordable, quality health care. This teaching is rooted in the biblical call to heal the sick and to serve 'the least of these,' our concern for human life and dignity, and the principle of the common good. Unfortunately, tens of millions of Americans do not have health insurance. According to the Catholic bishops of the United States, the current health care system is in need of fundamental reform."

The bishops had a overriding goal. Christian charity had not provided every American with "affordable, quality health care." So, the bishops opted venture into the realm of politics and asked their flock to petition the government to create a system which would provide "affordable, quality health care" to those Americans without.

To get the legislation enacted, they arrayed themselves with groups whose views on abortion and contraception were utterly incompatible with the church's tenets on abortion. Then to make matters worse, they allowed the President and his friends in Congress to specify the details of what an affordable, quality health care should cover. Not satisfied with the efforts of individuals and charities to provide for the sick and the poor, the bishops asked the government to intervene, and relied upon their caveat in their call for reform "that the federal ban on funding abortions be continued."

Now the bishops see the details. Now they find they got what they bargained for — and sadly more!

The new Department of Health and Human Services interim final rules provide that the Health Resources and Services Administration "may establish exemptions" for "religious employers and health insurance coverage provided in connection with group health plans established or maintained by religious employers with respect to any requirement to cover contraceptive services under such guidelines."

The problem that the bishops have is with the definition of "religious employers." The term "religious employer" does not include "an organization (other than one that) primarily employs persons who share the religious tenets of the organization," or an "organization (other than one that) that serves primarily persons who share the religious tenets of the organization."

As such, the exemption is not broad enough to cover Catholic universities and Catholic hospitals.

Now, having entered the political thicket, the church now, seeks to avoid this peculiar form of individual mandate, requiring it to procure unwanted contraception, including the Morning After, or (abortion) Drug, insurance coverage, and complains that the government is ignoring the separation of church and state.

Having enlisted with the president and Congress in getting Affordable Health Care passed, the bishops now may have to look to that same President Obama, or perhaps the third branch of government, the courts, to extricate them from the consequences of their own doing because they now believe that a regulation passed pursuant to the legislation violates their freedom of conscience. Buyers' remorse! It now appears the Catholic bishops should have had my mom.



Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2012, 2:00 pm - Quad-Cities Online

by John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2012, John Donald O'Shea