If the Affordable Care Act (A.C.T.) … a.k.a. Obamacare … remains the law of
the land, we will no doubt be reading many more reports of IRS abuses in the
future. Unfortunately, the stories may
well involve reports of churches and ministries being shut down, and priests
and pastors being hauled off to jail.
The Obama Administration has ordered
American employers to provide employee health insurance that covers ‘free’
contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs — or face crippling
fines. Christian business owners like
Bill Newland, president of Hercules
Industries, whom Alliance Defending
Freedom represents in a lawsuit against the president’s mandate, must
either choose to act contrary to their religious beliefs or follow the dictates
of their conscience; and, as a result, face steep fines that could put them out
of business.
In the past, the Alliance Defending Freedom was all about how the role of religion
in America is defined. Sadly, today,
they have become more about whether religion has a role at all. The lawsuits filed against Obamacare, for
example, are in sharp contrast to legal cases of the past that dealt with
differences of opinion on what the state may limit when it comes to religion. With Obamacare, on the other hand, the
administration is now trying to expunge religious expression altogether by
arguing that Christian entrepreneurs cannot exercise their religious
convictions even in running their own businesses.
The conservative movement has not yet
seriously entertained the notion of civil disobedience. However, some Catholic and evangelical
leaders have said they will close their hospitals, schools and businesses; and
go to jail … rather than comply with Obamacare's coercive mandates.
In a recent column, Archbishop Charles
Chaput of Philadelphia warns that our heritage of religious freedom is in jeopardy. He wrote: “…the latest IRS ugliness is a hint
of the treatment disfavored religious groups may face in the future, if we
sleep through the national discussion of religious liberty now. The day when Americans could take the
Founders' understanding of religious freedom as a given is over. We need to wake up.”
This is a message that needs to be
preached from every pulpit in this nation!
And every occupant in the pew had better prepare for the infringement of
their personal religious freedom as well!
Rev. Dr. Kenneth L. Beale, Jr.
Chaplain (Colonel-Ret), U.S. Army
Pastor, Ft. Snelling Memorial Chapel
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