Arizona Governor vetoes SB 1062

As a follow-up to my latest post, the awful law which spurned it has been vetoed. While it’s probably only a matter of time before they try again, at least, for now, decency has won.

Freedom of Religion vs. Freedom of Being

Does it really matter who the two are?

There’s a blog post that’s being passed around my Facebook feed from some of the more conservative elements of my friends’ list. In it, the author insists that it is right and just that Arizona business owners should be able to refuse service to homosexuals. He argues that it’s right because it protects Christians’ freedom of religion: that it is wrong of the government to force us to participate in events that we find “mortally sinful.”

But is this right?

The Reason of the Season

So a bit of a more timely rant.

I was on one of the many sites I visit off and on during the day, when I saw a piece talking about how to explain Christmas to kids when they aren’t celebrating the holiday for some reason (in the author’s case because she’s Jewish). And I will note that I absolutely love this line of the author’s:

The appeal of Christmas is that every year we try to chase something we can’t get, and to create the family situation we wished we had. Listen up, Jewish children. For Christmas celebrating peoples, Christmas is a chance to get it right, and even though we inevitably fail, we keep trying. –Julia Sonenshein

And we have to admit it’s kind of true: it’s a time we strive for an ideal of perfection and even though it may not always come through (you can read Carolyn Hax’s Holiday Hootenanny for some great examples of the holidays falling apart), we always come back and try again. I think that says a lot about us as humans and our capacity for hope.

Choice vs. Belief Continued

So a couple of nights (mornings…whatever. I work nights. It’s all confused) ago, I started talking about how the Archdiocese of New York has been given an exemption from the ACA mandate to providing insurance coverage on preventative care, aka contraceptives. And it seems that people of the internet find this a very distasteful, nay, discriminatory act! I’m still confused by the idea of this being discriminatory on the part of the Church. My husband tried explaining it that since the contraceptives mainly covered by insurance are birth control pills which are used solely by women, it can be possibly considered discriminatory because it’s an option that’s only good for one class of people. Okay, but this is a choice that women make. It is something that they choose because they believe that they have the right to decide when, if ever, they should bring life into this world.

Right to Choice vs. Right to Beliefs

So I’m starting with a hefty one here. But it’s what gave me the idea for this blog, so here goes.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) got passed. Well and good. We’re going to give health care to all people. Great!

The ACA mandates that insurance companies cover birth control. Well, now we have a problem.

On Monday, the Archdiocese of New York won an injunction to keep them and their affiliated services from having to have their insurance cover those options. This means that 25,000 workers won’t have any contraceptives, sterilization, or related counseling supplemented by their Church insurance. It also means that the Church won’t have to support methods with which they fundamentally disagree.

Why do I care?