The United States Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision that delivers a big win for the Little Sisters of the Poor and other religious organizations that have fought against the Obama Administration forcing them to participate in providing contraception and abortifacients to their employees. The Court vacated the judgements below and remanded the case so that the parties can “arrive at an approach going forward that accommodates petitioners’ religious exercise while at the same time ensuring that women covered petitioners’ health plans ‘receive full and equal health coverage, including contraceptive coverage.’”
Penny Nance, CEO and President of Concerned Women for America, had this to say:
This case was a no brainer. We applaud the Supreme Court Justices and congratulate the Little Sisters of the Poor and the other organizations that have worked so hard to protect religious liberty. Concerned Women for America (CWA) is proud to stand with all of them.
It still boggles the mind that the Obama Administration is so radical and insistent on violating the rights of conscience that it refused to see the numerous ways that it could accomplish its stated goals without having to force devoted nuns to violate their oaths before God.
CWA pointed this out in our numerous briefs at different stages of this case. There is no reason for the Obama Administration to insist on violating constitutional rights when it had already recognized the problem with religious liberty by offering accommodation to other groups. President Obama and his team simply blew it on this one and should be ashamed of all through which they have put these nuns.
Let us pray that the Administration has learned its lesson from this and comes up with a reasonable accommodation for people of faith with regards to this mandate. But with their dismal track record of outright hostility towards people of faith, I wouldn’t put it past them to come up with yet another way of violating religious freedom. That seems to be the goal — not to provide the contraceptives and abortifacients to women free of charge, but to force people of faith to approve of their practices and participate in something that violates our deeply held religious beliefs.
If that continues to be the goal, they won’t mind dragging the Little Sisters of the Poor back here to the Supreme Court to make another silly argument that they have compelling reasons to violate their constitutional rights.
For an interview with Penny Nance contact Janae Stracke at jstracke@cwfa.org or 712-269-1724.