Kentucky: HB 145 Stuck in Committee: TAKE ACTION NOW!!!
HB 145 Stuck in Committee: TAKE ACTION NOW!!! PLEASE http://conta.cc/z2bBFt
HB 145 Stuck in Committee: TAKE ACTION NOW!!! PLEASE
Check out my latest campaign by Constant Contact.
To help us continue to fight executions in Kentucky, please consider a generous donation. Send checks or money orders to our office address listed above or use our safe and convenient PayPal Account. Click on the Contribute to KCADP link in the column to the left.
Kentucky: Why HB 145 is Needed
This case illustrates why HB 145, a bill to keep Kentucky from executing severely mentally ill defendants is needed. This prosecutor wanted the state to kill this defendant, but decided that since it would take so long it would not be logical to pursue the death penalty. He should not even have an opportunity to call for this severely mentally ill defendant’s death. Call 1 800 372 7181 and urge House Judiciary Chair, John Tilley, to call this bill for a hearing in his committee. The votes are there to support it.
Reaching a decision against seeking the death penalty was a tough call for Warren County Commonwealth’s Attorney Chris Cohron.
“I have struggled more than I have in any other case from the standpoint everything in my heart told me the only resolution for Ms. Coy was the death penalty,” Cohron said after the hearing. But because Kentucky rarely executes people on death row, and many death convictions are overturned, a guilty plea with a sentence of life without parole is a “logical resolution.”
Guilty but mentally ill
www.bgdailynews.com
A Morgantown woman pleaded guilty but mentally ill today to kidnapping and killing a pregnant woman and taking her unborn baby.
North Dakota: NDCC Issues Statement on Abortion Drug Safety Law Delay
The North Dakota Catholic Conference has issued the following statement on the Fargo District Court’s decision to delay implementation of North Dakota’s Abortion Drug Safety law:
The North Dakota Catholic Conference is disappointed that Judge Corwin has again put on hold implementation of North Dakota’s abortion drug safety law.
The law, which passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, has one purpose: the safety of women. The legislation was not intended to, nor does it, prohibit the use of abortion drugs. It only requires that they be used according to the protocol that was submitted to the Food and Drug Administration when it approved the drug for use in the United States.
Particularly shameful is the fact that abortion proponents are using this case to get the courts to declare a right to abortion under the state constitution. If they succeed, all of North Dakota’s abortion laws could be struck down, threatening the health and lives of both unborn children and women.
We remain confident, however, that the intent of the Legislative Assembly will be respected and that the courts will respect North Dakotan’s desire to build a culture of life that respects and cares for both women and unborn children.
North Dakota: Bismarck Tribune: Catholic schools unification makes sense
“Catholic education has had an important role in the fulfilling the lives of citizens of Bismarck and Mandan. For the Catholic parishes, parochial schools have been an issue of faith, shaping the student’s spirit as well as his or her mind. To see Catholic education here reinvigorated and looking toward tomorrow bodes well for the community.”
Missouri: Read about education, the abortion-drug mandate and the death penalty in this week’s Capitol Update
Read about education, the abortion-drug mandate and the death penalty in this week’s Capitol Update.
Capitol Update 2/17/2012
campaign.r20.constantcontact.com
religious freedoms. This week a state senate committee approved a religious liberty bill and sent it to the floor of the Missouri Senate. Debate is expected next week.
Maryland: Marriage Update
Marriage Update: Debate resumes at 12:30pm. Urge your delegates not to waver: http://capwiz.com/mdcath/issues/alert/?alertid=61014476
Marriage Update – Quick Response Needed
www.capwiz.com
Information on Maryland’s government.
Kentucky: Action Alert on Death Penalty
Please call 1-800-372-7181, the legislative hotline, and leave a message for House Judiciary Chairman John Tilley asking that he give HB 145 a hearing. There are more than enough committee members willing to vote YES to send this bill to the House floor.
Stop executing the mentally ill | Editorial | Kentucky.com
www.kentucky.com
The death penalty in Kentucky has come under profound and justified scrutiny.
California: What Does HHS Mandate Mean?
The White House’s announcement on February 10, that it would require insurers instead of employers to pay for contraception, sterilization and abortifacients has not changed the very narrow definition of religious employer contained in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regulations. The rule states that to be a religious employer an organization must “serve primarily persons who share the[ir] religious tenets.”
In fact, the effort to remedy the situation announced by President Obama last week not only finalized the HSS rule but left unanswered critical questions, such as how self-insured organizations can comply if the mandate violates their religious beliefs. Many Catholic organizations – dioceses, hospitals and schools – are self-insured to avoid such conflicts with government mandates. Also open: how would HHS determine if an institution is “religious” enough to qualify as a religious employer? What other mandates might be imposed further down the road? How will insurance companies pay for coverage without passing costs on to employers?
California: Catholic Healthcare West Becomes Dignity Health – What Does It Mean?
By: Most Reverend George H. Niederauer, Archbishop of San Francisco
In late January 2012 Catholic Healthcare West (CHW), a San Francisco-based health care system that operates 25 Catholic and 15 non-Catholic hospitals, announced that it had changed its governance structure and name, and would henceforth be known as Dignity Health. Several media headlines proclaimed that CHW undertook this action in order to “pare its ties with the Church” in a “quest to grow.” Some of these reports implied that Catholic bishops had approved such a result. These headlines and the stories that accompanied them have left many Catholics and the larger public with the mistaken impression that CHW’s Catholic hospitals had become secular health care facilities. This is not the case. I am writing to clarify the situation.
North Dakota: Minot Daily News – Nothing But a Shell Game
“President Barack Obama’s attempt to dodge political flak over his administration’s attack on religious freedom is nothing more than a shell game.”
North Dakota: Letter Sets Facts Straight
http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/229389/group/Opinion/
BISMARCK — In her letter, Betsy Perkins accuses Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., of failing the truth test about the new sterilization and contraception mandate (“‘Controversial’ rule mirrors established law,” Page D3, Feb. 12).
In fact, she fails the truth test on several points.
Perkins claims that the new federal mandate is not new, citing an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruling from 2000 and the alleged existence of similar laws in 60 percent of the states.
Here’s the truth. The EEOC recommendation was just that — a recommendation. It has never had the force of law. If it had, the new rule would be moot.
What about those “60 percent” of the states? All but three of those states contain a broad exemption for religious employers. Moreover, even without a religious exemption, religious employers already can avoid the contraceptive mandates in 28 states by self-insuring their prescription drug coverage, dropping that coverage altogether or opting for regulation under a federal law (ERISA) that pre-empts state law.
The new Department of Health and Human Services mandate closes off all these avenues of relief.
On the contraception coverage alone, the new rule is unprecedented. But here’s another fact. The new mandate includes sterilization, which is not included in any state mandate except in Vermont. But Vermont has a religious employer and self-insured exemption.
Perkins also wrongly claims that the new mandate merely states that if an employer offers a prescription drug plan, it also must cover contraception. On the contrary, the new mandate states that insurers or employers must provide sterilization and contraception at no charge, regardless of whether they offer a prescription drug plan.
The truth is this: The mandate, even under the “compromise” recently offered by the president, is an unprecedented infringement upon religious liberty. Even the latest proposal still treats religious mission-based operations as not truly religious.
The irony is that many religions teach that faith means more than worshiping in churches, synagogues and mosques. It means feeding the poor, burying the dead, healing the sick, housing the homeless and caring for those in need.
But the federal government has now declared that the more you do that, the less religious you are in its eyes.
Christopher Dodson
Dodson is executive director of and general counsel for the North Dakota Catholic Conference.
Missouri Senate Moving Swiftly on Religious Liberty
Action Alert–Missouri Senate Moving Swiftly on Religious Liberty http://conta.cc/zD6n5g
Action Alert–Missouri Senate Moving Swiftly on Religious Liberty
Check out my latest campaign by Constant Contact.
The Missouri Senate is moving swiftly to respond to the Obama Administration’s recent edict that employers, including the Catholic Church, provide health coverage for contraceptives, sterilization procedures and abortion drugs. SB 749, sponsored by Senator John Lamping (R-Clayton), won committee app…
Minnesota: Joint Religious Legislative Coalition’s (JRLC) Day on the Hill
And What Does God Require? – Day on the Hill 2012
Tuesday March 20, 2012 — Register Now!
The Joint Religious Legislative Coalition’s (JRLC) Day on the Hill is our annual policy briefing and lobby day. Participants are briefed on portions of the JRLC agenda that are being debated and voted on at our State Capitol. Clergy and lay people from across the state attend Day on the Hill to show our interfaith commitment to social justice and to participate in the lawmaking process. Registration is required. Participants gather in the morning at RiverCentre in downtown St. Paul for inspiration and issue briefings. Buses then transport us to the Capitol for a short rally. Meetings are held with legislators in the afternoon. Buses shuttle between RiverCentre and the Capitol until 4:00 p.m.
Rev. Alika Galloway, Kwanzaa Community Church, will be our keynote speaker. This year’s theme, And What Does God Require?, comes from Deuteronomy 10: 12-13, 17-18:
So now, O Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? Only to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments of the Lord your God and his decrees that I am commanding you today, for your own well-being… For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, who executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and who loves the strangers, providing them with food and clothing.
Tentative Schedule
RiverCentre, 7th St. and Kellogg Ave, downtown St. Paul
8:30 a.m. Gathering, Registration, Breakfast
8:55 a.m. Welcome – Opening Prayer, About the Day
9:30 a.m. Keynote Speaker – Rev. Alika P. Galloway, Kwanzaa Community Church, Minneapolis
10:00 a.m. Issue Briefings – Brian Rusche, JRLC and Marie Reigstad, Catholic Charities Office for Social Justice
10:30 a.m. District Table Discussion – Alison Killeen, JRLC, and District Leaders
11:15 a.m. Bus to the Capitol
Rotunda and State Capital Complex
11:45 a.m. 2011 Interfaith Social Justice Awards
• iCAN Key Advocate of 2012 Award
• 2012 Interfaith Social Justice Community Award
• 2012 Lawrence D. Gibson Interfaith Social Justice Award
12:15 p.m. A Prayer for Justice
Afternoon Meetings with your legislators in Capitol or State Office Building
2:00 p.m. iCAN Key Advocate Caucus
3:15 p.m. Closing Action and Prayer
Drop off debriefing sheets and evaluation form and recycle name tags at front door of Capitol
4:00 p.m. Last shuttle back to RiverCentre
Shuttle Service: 17 school buses will begin departing RiverCentre at 11:15 a.m. to get all of us to the Capitol by 11:45 a.m. Look for the JRLC sign in the bus window. Two school buses will regularly shuttle between the front entrance of the Capitol and RiverCentre starting at 1:00 p.m. and the last shuttle departs from the Capitol at 4:00 p.m.
Kentucky: Half-Way Mark
2012 Session Nears Halfway Mark | Catholic Conference of Kentucky
ccky.org
As this year’s General Assembly session nears the half-way mark bills of interest to the Catholic Conference have advanced; others still stalled; some not yet introduced.
Arizona: Legislative Update
New York: “This isn’t a fight of our choosing.”
“We bishops aren’t fighters, we’re pastors. We want to stand on principle. We just want to do our work as effectively as we can…This isn’t a fight of our choosing.”
Dolan urges Obama to back down on birth control – CBS News
www.cbsnews.com
Soon to be cardinal said Obama had promised to work with Catholic church in Oval Office meeting last year
Michigan: Editorial in Detroit Free Press
Michigan Catholic Conference President and Chief Executive Officer Paul A. Long writes in today’s Detroit Free Press: “Nearly three years after President Barack Obama called for the protection of conscience rights at the University of Notre Dame, not only has he failed to honor his words, last month he authorized perhaps the most egregious and sweeping intrusion into the religious liberty and conscience rights of every American citizen.” Continue reading…
Virginia: Victory for Adoption Agencies
Full Senate endorses bill protecting right of child-placing agencies to practice what they profess.
Earlier this afternoon, the Senate approved a top Virginia Catholic Conference initiative by a 22-18 vote. The legislation provides strong, explicit conscience protections for adoption and foster care agencies, so that those agencies are not forced to participate in placements that would violate their religious convictions. Last Friday, an identical bill passed the House of Delegates by an overwhelming71-28 vote.
Conference Director Jeff Caruso provided comments on today’s critical Senate vote. “Virginia’s Catholic bishops and their two dioceses, including the Catholic Charities agencies in both dioceses, are extremely grateful to all in the Senate and House who voted in favor of this essential conscience rights bill,” said Caruso. “Today, the Senate affirmed religious liberty and the great work done by private adoption agencies, including those that have sincerely held religious and moral beliefs regarding marriage and the family. I also wish to express particular gratitude to our patrons, Senator Jeffrey McWaters and Delegate Todd Gilbert, and to Governor McDonnell for his support of the legislation.”
The Conference looks forward to the full passage of the identical Senate and House bills and their arrival on the Governor’s desk.
If you are viewing this alert via the Conference’s website or if a friend forwarded it to you, you are invited to join the Conference’s advocacy network, which would enable you to receive regular alerts and updates from the Conference directly by email. If interested, please click here and complete the very short electronic form that is provided.
In prayer and in public, your voices are urgently needed to bring Gospel values to bear on vital decisions being made by those who represent you!
Kentucky’s Catholic Bishops Urge Government to Honor the Constitution
Kentucky’s Catholic Bishops Urge Government to Honor the Constitution | Catholic Conference of Kentu
ccky.org
The Catholic Conference of Kentucky joins our fellow bishops and other religious leaders in expressing our deep concern about the recent decision of the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services to require that almost all employers, including Catholic employers, will be forced to offer their emp…
Texas: Bishops Urge State Delegation to Oppose HHS Mandate
Texas’ Roman Catholic Bishops today urged the state’s Congressional delegation to strongly oppose new governmental mandates requiring religious employers to provide contraceptive, abortifacient, and sterilization services as part of their health care plans.
In a letter sent to all members of Congress from Texas, the bishops called “unconscionable and unnecessary” the new U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) requirement that is being attached as part of the Affordable Care Act of 2011. The mandate has provoked a groundswell of controversy since its announcement two weeks ago.
“For religiously based social service agencies, health care providers, and educational institutions, this mandate abrogates our country’s foremost right to religious freedom,” wrote Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, and Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller, of the Archdiocese of San Antonio, on behalf of the Texas bishops.
The HHS mandate “. . .forces religious employers into bitter choices: to violate their religious convictions and consciences, to stop providing health coverage for their employees, or to end the charitable, medical, and educational services that for centuries have provided a crucial safety net to the poor and vulnerable of our society,” the Cardinal and Archbishop wrote.
The letter urges members of the Texas congressional delegation to co-sponsor the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act–co-sponsored by U.S. Reps. Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) and Dan Boren (D-OK) in the U.S. House and U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) in the U.S. Senate–that preserves freedom of conscience for those who provide or purchase health care coverage.
“These bills will prevent any mandates under the Affordable Care Act from effectively disregarding the freedom of conscience and brings law into line with the federal government’s long tradition of respect for those rights,” said the bishops. “Institutions that sponsor, purchase, or issue health plans should not be forced to contravene their religious principles just to provide insurance to their employees; nor should families be forced to violate their religious convictions to care for their children.”
The bishops have also asked Catholics across the state to contact their members of Congress to voice their concerns. The Texas Catholic Conference, the public policy voice of the Texas Bishops, has created a web site, www.TXcatholic.org/HHSMandate.asp, to assist in contacting members of Congress and the Obama Administration regarding protecting religious freedoms and supporting the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act. The Conference web site also includes links to the Bishops’ letters, blog posts, and news coverage on the issue.
Missouri: Join in Rally for Religious Liberty
Join as as we rally for religious liberty in March at the State Capitol.
MCC Joins Other Faith Groups in Rally for Religious Liberty
On Tuesday, March 27, St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson and Dr. John L. Yeats, executive director of the Missouri Baptist Convention, will join other prominent religious leaders from around the state at a Rally for Religious Liberty at the rotunda of the Missouri State Capitol building in Jefferso…
Maryland: Catholic Lobby Night
Less than 2 weeks away from Catholic Lobby Night! Stand Strong in the Public Square & be Activated by Faith. Find out what’s happening in Annapolis & then go meet with your legislators. Must register: www.mdcathcon.org/lobbynight
California: Response to Court Ruling on Prop. 8
In response to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling on February 7, 2012, which ruled California’s ban on same-sex marriages unconstitutional, Bishop Wilkerson, President of the California Catholic Conference issued the following statement:
“We are disappointed by the ruling today by a panel of the Ninth Circuit that would invalidate the action taken by the people of California affirming that marriage unites a woman and a man and any children from their union. However, given the issues involved and the nature of the legal process, it’s always been clear that this case would very likely be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. Marriage between one man and one woman has been—and always will be—the most basic building block of the family and of our society.
“In the end, through sound legal reasoning, we believe the court will see this as well and uphold the will of the voters as expressed in Proposition 8. We continue to pray for that positive outcome.”
Bishop Mulvey Defends Religious Liberty in Latest Texas Catholic Podcast
Corpus Christi Bishop Wm. Michael Mulvey explains how the Obama Administration’s forcing of religious employers to provide contraceptive and abortifacient coverage is an assault on religious liberty in the most recent episode of the Texas Catholic Podcast.
The podcast, available via iTunes or on the Texas Catholic Conference Audio Archive, was recorded during Bishop Mulvey’s homily at the Corpus Christi Cathedral on January 29, 2012. In it, Bishop Mulvey stressed that his objections to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate were not political in nature, but were instead, “a matter of conscience. This is a matter of religious freedom.”
“The Administration has cast aside the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, denying to Catholics our nation’s first and most fundamental freedom, that of religious liberty,” Mulvey told parishioners. “This is a dangerous path for our government to follow, as it violates one of the core values upon which our country was founded.”
Bishop Mulvey called upon the faithful to pray for the protection of religious liberty and contact their Congressmen to reverse the HHS ruling. He also used the opportunity to elaborate on the Church’s teaching on conscience and why its protection is intrinsically tied to the free practice of religion, emphasizing that conscience is being present to one’s self so that one “can hear the truth revealed by God in Jesus Christ and live and act by it.“
Listeners can access Bishop Mulvey’s letter on the mandate on the Diocese of Corpus Christi’s web site at www.diocesecc.org.
Missouri: Where Does Your Congressional Delegate Stand on Rights of Conscience Act
Find out where your congressional delegate stands on the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act.
Where is Missouri’s Congressional Delegation on HHS Mandate?
www.mocatholic.org
Currently there are two bills going through Congress to protect conscience rights, S. 1467 and HR 1179. Both of these would protect religious employers or health plans from having to provide coverage for contraceptives, sterilization procedures or abortion-inducing drugs. Here is how the Missouri Co…