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Thursday, 09 February 2012 17:49

Written by Reg Henry

The great contraception scandal has now reached a point in right-wing propaganda where the truth has been left in the dust. In the familiar way of if-you-repeat-it-so-many-times-it-becomes-the-reality, conservatives have reduced the charge to foisting contraception on a church that doesn't believe in it.

Well, not quite. The facts were well set down in a PG editorial last Friday. Some of you don't read PG editorials, which makes me sad, because they are full of wisdom and insight. But enough about the ones I write.

Actually, I did not write the contraception one, which was titled "Equitable Compromise."

Here are some pertinent parts excerpted by me so as to concentrate solely on the much- abused facts...

Last month, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said that starting in about 18 months, many faith-based employers will have to provide health insurance coverage that includes reproductive services.

The ruling requires that religious groups that run institutions employing people of different faiths and serving the general public must offer medical coverage that includes free birth control. The compromise affects most church-run hospitals, universities and charitable groups.

Most faith-based workplaces — houses of worship, schools and colleges where the employees and the people served share the faith of their employers — are exempt from the regulation. No institution is required to perform, or pay for, abortions.

HHS asked the nonpartisan Institute of Medicine to recommend preventive services for women that should be included in regulations arising from the health care reform law. The institute's report, issued last August, made nine recommendations, including breast-feeding and domestic violence support and counseling, as well as the controversial provision about contraceptive services.

Twenty-eight states have contraceptive-equity laws, which require birth control coverage for plans that cover prescription drugs. In these states, the Catholic Church has figured out how to comply with the law without damage to its religious conscience. Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., offers two health insurance options, including a group plan that includes reproductive services.

This is not what you hear from right-wing politicians. The way they tell it, you would think that nuns in convents had to have insurance for the pill.

So what you really have is a compromise, exempting one level of the church — its purely religious function — but not its secular arm peopled not only by Catholics but those of many faiths and none, people who really ought to have access to birth control if they want it.

That this is a compromise gives the lie to the preposterous charge that the Obama administration has declared war on the Catholic Church. If this were really a war against the church, logically the important distinction in the rules wouldn't even exist.

I will allow that this compromise may be imperfect and needs to be refined. For the life of me, I don't understand why the Obama administration can't fudge this, in the manner that Georgetown University has done (see above). It may be more evidence of how politically inept this administration can be.

I would like to see this happen as a matter of principle — this country was founded by people fleeing religious discrimination in the Old World. In the pantheon of rights, freedom of religion occupies one of the most prominent places.

But it gets tricky. Like all rights, freedom of religion is not absolute.

Hate-filled Christians who try to disrupt soldiers' funerals because they think America is being punished for condoning homosexuality cannot barge into churches pleading the First Amendment (they can protest but usually they must keep their distance).

A Muslim father who kills his daughter in this country to avenge a loss of honor is not going to be forgiven by American law.

Devout Christian inn keepers or shopkeepers cannot turn away gay people or black people as customers because their presence may compromise the merchants' strict religious beliefs. The law recognizes that public accommodations must be open to everyone despite what people may believe.

This complex issue with its difficult distinctions is not suited to demagoguery. If an election wasn't coming up soon, it might pass by. But for the right, it is a target not to be ignored.

The reason is that it feeds into grubby myths about Obama that the most partisan conservatives have been avidly encouraging for the past four years — he's not really one of us, he despises people who cling to their guns and religion, he may be a Muslim, if he's not a Muslim then still he's in the thrall of black racist Christian church. And so on and so on.

It is a case of much ado, not about nothing, but too much ado about something.