Tag: Politics

To Mr. Obama, From a Conscientious Objector

~ Evan Lenow ~ 6 Comments

Dear Mr. President:

In recent weeks, a decision by your Administration has stirred great controversy among people of faith regarding the requirement that insurance policies offer free access to all FDA-approved contraceptives and sterilization. On the basis of the freedom of religion guaranteed to me as a citizen of the United States of America in the First Amendment of the Constitution, I want to state my conscientious objection to this policy.

First, the requirement of insurance policies to offer contraceptives to all people at no charge violates my religiously-held belief that life begins at conception. Among these contraceptives are drugs known to cause the elimination of a fetus after conception by preventing implantation of a fertilized egg in the uterine wall. Such drugs (e.g., Plan B, Ella) are more properly called birth control because contraceptives, strictly defined, prevent conception. These drugs act to prevent birth after conception. On the grounds of teaching in the Bible, I believe that all life begins at conception. In Psalm 139:13–16, we read that God forms children in the womb, and He has planned our days before we are ever born. God is intimately involved in the creation of life from the very moment of conception. In addition, Genesis 1:27 tells us that all humans are created in the image of God. The inherent value of God’s image begins at the moment human life begins—at conception.

Second, the requirement of insurance policies to offer contraceptives to all people at no charge makes me complicit in funding these abortifacient drugs. While you have offered exemptions to churches, I work at a religious school. It is debatable whether my school will meet the exemption standard. However, it is clear that the insurance program my school uses will be forced to comply. In the insurance business, it is an elementary principle that costs are passed along to the consumer through higher premiums. Even if the insurance companies have to “pay out of pocket” for those contraceptives (according to last week’s “compromise”), the burden will merely shift to the individual consumer—making us all complicit. This too violates my conscience and freedom of religion.

Third, the requirement of insurance policies to offer contraceptives to all people at no charge extends beyond the constitutional authority of the federal government. Insurance companies are businesses that are not owned by the federal government. Government has no constitutional authority to require business to offer a service at their own expense. In addition, the mandate of the Affordable Care Act that requires all individuals to have insurance extends beyond the constitutional authority of the federal government. In order to live and breathe in America, the government is attempting to force citizens to buy insurance. This is a gross abuse of power on the part of the federal government.

I humbly request that you rescind the current contraception regulation proposed by Secretary Sebelius and rescind the insurance mandate of the Affordable Care Act. These actions are a violation of your constitutional authority, and the contraceptive mandate is a violation of my guaranteed right to freedom of religion. I would like to remind you that the Bill of Rights was written “in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of [the federal government’s] powers” (Preamble to the Bill of Rights). The current mandates are both a misconstruction and abuse of powers. The First Amendment trumps these mandates.

Please know that even today I have prayed for you and your Administration as instructed in 1 Timothy 2:1–2, which reads, “First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.” I pray for wisdom on your behalf to protect the consciences of the citizens over whom you have authority and to respect the teachings of Scripture which you claim to believe.

Sincerely,

Evan Lenow
Conscientious Objector

ObamaCare and the First Amendment

~ Evan Lenow

During the debates surrounding the adoption of the Constitution, it became clear that the people of the United States desired further protection from tyranny by the government. As a result, Congress drafted amendments to the Constitution that ensured certain rights could not be trampled by the government. The ten amendments that were passed came to be known as the Bill of Rights. The little-known preamble to the Bill of Rights reads:

The Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.

With such a desire to prevent misconstruction or abuse, the states adopted these amendments. Among them was an amendment granting religious liberty to the people. This first protection granted to the people states in part:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. . . .

This guarantee of religious liberty has prevented the government from establishing a state-sponsored religion or church and has protected the free exercise of religion in this country. With this protection has come the application of freedom of conscience on religious grounds. This has allowed Mennonites and other pacifists to object to service in the military during times of compulsory service through the draft. It has allowed doctors and pharmacists to object to issuing drugs or services that violated their religious beliefs.

Now freedom of religion and freedom of conscience face a new challenge—the Affordable Care Act (aka, ObamaCare). Under guidelines presented by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, organizations providing health insurance coverage for their employees will have to include coverage for all FDA-approved contraception at no charge to the participants. Such contraceptives include Plan B (the morning after pill), intra-uterine devices, and sterilization.

Religious organizations of all types have historically voiced opposition to some or all of these forms of contraception. In fact, Plan B and IUD’s are more properly labeled birth control rather than contraception because they prevent birth after conception rather than preventing conception in the first place.

Catholics have presented the most consistent stance against birth control throughout these debates. Their reaction to this ruling has been firm and unyielding. On the last Sunday of January, Catholic priests around the country read letters from bishops condemning the new regulations and calling on President Obama to reverse course. In the days that followed, the Obama administration attempted to strengthen its stance with no sign of wavering.

The Obama administration has offered some veiled exceptions to this guideline, but they are less than satisfactory to many people of faith. The specific exceptions read:

Group health plans sponsored by certain religious employers, and group health insurance coverage in connection with such plans, are exempt from the requirement to cover contraceptive services. A religious employer is one that:  (1) has the inculcation of religious values as its purpose; (2) primarily employs persons who share its religious tenets; (3) primarily serves persons who share its religious tenets; and (4) is a non-profit organization under Internal Revenue Code section 6033(a)(1) and section 6033(a)(3)(A)(i) or (iii).  45 C.F.R. §147.130(a)(1)(iv)(B).

While these exceptions may benefit churches that provide healthcare plans to their employees, large religious organizations, such as schools, charities, etc, will be forced to provide contraception. Can you imagine Baptist liberal arts colleges being forced to provide Plan B to faculty and employees at no charge through their insurance programs? Can you imagine Catholic Charities offering insurance that allows their employees unlimited access to free contraception?

Secretary Sebelius responded to criticism in a USA Today opinion piece and noted three reasons for the requirement and the minimal exceptions. Her rationale is 1) almost all women use birth control at some point in their lives, but birth control is expensive; 2) churches get an exemption; and 3) 28 states require contraception coverage, and 8 of those states offer no exemptions.

In response to the first argument, it makes little logical sense. We could use the same argumentation to say that most Americans are overweight and would like to lose weight. Therefore, all FDA-approved methods of losing weight should be made available at no charge—fitness centers, lap band, gastric bypass, etc. In fact, the government ought to ban all unhealthy food using this argumentation.

The second argument demonstrates some concern for religious liberty on behalf of the administration. Unfortunately, they drew the lines too narrowly. In a Supreme Court case earlier this year, the high court unanimously upheld religious liberty protection for religious schools even if they taught subjects other than religion. The exemptions should apply to all religious organizations—churches, schools, charities, etc.

The third argument is misleading. Just over half the states require contraception coverage. This leaves 22 states that have no requirement. Of those 28 states, 20 offer broad exemptions. Of the 8 that offer no exemptions, 5 still provide a workaround for religious organizations. That leaves only 3 of 50 states that require contraception coverage with no exemptions. Those states are Oregon, New York, and California. Thus, the new federal regulation offers fewer exemptions that 47 of the 50 states.

This is more than just a contraception issue—it is a religious liberty issue. Schools and charities have been granted an extra year to reach compliance (conveniently after the presidential election). This federal regulation needs to be changed. Broader exemptions must be granted. No constitutional scholar could, in good faith, support this regulation. In fact, most high school students in an American Government class should be able to see through the veil of these federal guideline. This administration needs to go back and read the Bill of Rights “in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers.”

_________________________

Health Resources and Services Administration, “Women’s Preventative Services: Required Health Plan Coverage Guidelines,” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Kathleen Sebelius, “Kathleen Sebelius: Contraception rule respects religion,” USA Today, February 5, 2012.

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “A statement by U. S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius,” January 20, 2012.

Roe v. Wade 39 Years Later

~ Evan Lenow

Yesterday was the 39th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade. This case, and its lesser known counterpart Doe v. Bolton, opened the door to abortion on demand in the United States. The case has received a ton of attention through the last four decades, and it has been challenged several times in court. As it stands today, abortion is still accessible in the United States, and the tragedy of the killing of more than 50 million innocent babies in the womb may be the largest example of legalized killing in all of human history. It is a horrendous problem that our culture (and our legal system) seems unwilling to address.

Although my posts are generally biblical/theological in nature, there is a great article on The Public Discourse today about the faulty legal arguments on which Roe v. Wade is based. I encourage you to read the entire article, but here are some interesting snippets.

After nearly four decades, Roe’s human death toll stands at nearly sixty million human lives, a total exceeding the Nazi Holocaust, Stalin’s purges, Pol Pot’s killing fields, and the Rwandan genocide combined. Over the past forty years, one-sixth of the American population has been killed by abortion. One in four African-Americans is killed before birth. Abortion is the leading cause of (unnatural) death in America.

The legal definitions and categories created by these two cases were unique:

Roe, coupled with Doe, creates a plenary right to kill the embryo or fetus for essentially any reason, at any time throughout all nine months of pregnancy. Distilled to its essence, Roe created a “trimester” framework for abortion. In roughly the first three months of pregnancy, the right of abortion is avowedly plenary: abortion may be had for any reason. In the second three months, government may regulate abortion to protect the life or health of the mother, but again the right to have an abortion remains plenary. In the final three months—after the point of “viability,” when the human fetus could live on his or her own outside the mother’s womb—Roe says that abortion can be restricted or prohibited . . . except where abortion is necessary to protect the “life or health” of the pregnant woman.

This is a big exception. And here is where Doe steps in. On its face, Roe might appear, to the unwary or uninitiated, “moderate”—its trimester-balancing framework a measured, reasonable-sounding, proportionate act of judicial legislation concerning abortion. It is Doe that does a lot of the work, through an indirect and ultimately disingenuous definition of the “health” reasons that always may justify a woman’s decision to have an abortion and trump any interest of society in protecting fetal human life, even when the child could survive outside the mother’s womb. Doe holds that relevant “health” considerations justifying late-term abortions include “all factors—physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age—relevant to the well-being of the patient. All these factors may relate to health.” (Doe’s understanding of “the patient” did not include the fetus; Roe held elsewhere that the human fetus has no legal rights that any person is bound to respect.)

The legal foundations for Roe v. Wade are untenable:

Roe’s reasoning, distilled to its essentials, is that the Constitution creates a “privacy” right to abortion, on the premise that the right not “to bear” a child is protected by the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. No serious constitutional law scholar thinks this is a plausible reading of the Due Process Clause. That clause forbids government to “deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law.” Without due process of law are crucial words. The Due Process Clause does not say that government never may deprive a person of life, liberty or property. It only says that government may not do so “without due process of law”—that is, arbitrarily, lawlessly, not in conformity with duly enacted laws and accepted procedures for their application.

In Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Supreme Court rested the right to abortion back where Roe purported to find it, in the Due Process Clause. Recognizing the embarrassments created by this view, Casey added another prop: the doctrine of precedent or “stare decisis,” which is essentially all that is left to support Roe. But Casey’s invocation of the doctrine was transparently disingenuous: Because the public expects the Court to adhere (usually) to its past decisions, because the Court had staked its authority on Roe, and because the Court might be viewed unfavorably by some of the public if it reversed itself in such a case, the Court said that it had decided to adhere to Roe “whether or not mistaken.” Thus, what Roe held to be required by substantive due process Casey held to be required by stare decisis, even assuming Roe to be wrong.

The immorality of the decision and its result is unbearable:

Here is the problem, undressed: If human embryonic life is morally worthy of protection, we have permitted sixty million murders under our watch. Faced with this prospect, many of us—maybe even most—flee from the facts. We deny that the living human embryo is “truly” or “fully” human life, adopt a view that whether the embryo or fetus is human “depends,” or can be judged in degrees, on a sliding scale over the course of pregnancy; or we proclaim uncertainty about the facts of human biology; or we proclaim moral agnosticism about the propriety of “imposing our views on others”; or we throw up our hands and give up because moral opposition to an entrenched, pervasive social practice is not worth the effort, discomfort, and social costs. The one position not on the table—the one possibility too hard to look at—is that abortion is a grave moral wrong on a par with the greatest human moral atrocities of all time and that we passively, almost willingly, accept it as such.

Let us not forget that a great atrocity is taking place in our society, all in the name of a right to privacy. Who will protect the rights of the unborn?

_________________________

Michael Stokes Paulsen, “The Unbearable Wrongness of Roe,” The Public Discourse, January 23, 2012.

The Ugly American History of Eugenics

~ Evan Lenow ~ 1 Comment

Most Americans live with the belief that we are the greatest society in the world. Our roots stem from proclamations “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” We confidently assert that we always take the moral high ground on the world stage. We swell with pride over the idea that the American Dream is for everyone.

However, deep down we know that there is an ugly side to American history. We are not a perfect people, and we have made egregious errors in our brief history as a nation. Many of those errors have been swept under the rug of American pride, but this week the rug was pulled up to expose a terrible reality from the not-too-distant past.

A task force in North Carolina recommended on Tuesday that the state should pay $50,000 to each living sterilization victim of the state’s eugenics program. Eugenics? Forced sterilization? This has the ring of Nazi Germany, not the United States. Unfortunately, it is true.

For those unfamiliar with the term, what exactly is eugenics? Grenz and Smith define it this way:

A movement that encourages the study of heredity or the transference of genetically based traits from one generation of living beings to the next, generally with the goal of improving the hereditary endowment of humankind.

Eugenics generally has two sides—positive and negative. Positive eugenics encourages (or even rewards) healthy, intelligent individuals to reproduce. The idea is that they improve the human gene pool by passing along their desirable traits. Negative eugenics discourages reproduction by those exhibiting inferior traits. While this may seem to be a noble idea on the surface, it played out in ugly ways in American history.

Paul Lombardo describes the ugly side as follows:

In the 20th century, application of eugenical theory as a solution to social problems in America led to such ethically problematic practices as wide-scale sexual sterilization of epileptics, the mentally ill, and the retarded, restrictions on the immigration of some ethnic groups, and prohibition of marriages between people of differing racial backgrounds.

That brings us back to North Carolina. Between 1929 and 1974, the NC Eugenics Board authorized the sterilization of 7,600 people. The Charlotte Observer reports:

Some cases approved by the Eugenics Board were people who were mentally ill and sexually aggressive, and families who wanted to stop having children. But the board also authorized sterilizing people who were poor, or part of large families, or whose parents worried that men might take advantage of them. Some victims were as young as 10.

North Carolina is the first state to propose reparations for the victims. It is by no means the only state that implemented such horrendous practices. Some reports estimate that 33 different states had eugenics laws that allowed for forced sterilization and that more than 60,000 American were sterilized in the process.

How did our country get to this point? From an ethical standpoint, it involved the use of a consequentialist ethic. Consequentialism is the idea that ethical decisions are made based on projected outcomes. There are several different theories that implement this process, but the basic idea is that the ends justify the means. In the case of eugenics, the desired end was a society full of healthy, productive, intelligent people. The logic of consequentialism said that any means necessary to produce that desired result is acceptable. This included forcibly prohibiting those deemed “unacceptable” from reproducing.

From a scientific angle, the impetus for eugenics came from the fledgling field of genetics. While the exact nature of genetic study was still a long way off, animal breeders had long known that breeding “superior” animals together generally resulted in better offspring. The process of selective breeding in animals was transferred to humans in the eugenics movement of the late-19th and 20th centuries.

From a political perspective, the value of the society over the individual spurred on the acceptance of eugenics. Social problems involving care for the poor and ill, immigration of those viewed as “undesirable,” and the desire for a progressive society led to the implementation of such laws.

Thankfully, our society has moved past this ugly history. Or have we? While the practice of forced sterilization and eugenics laws have crept back into the darkness of history, the idea still exists and is often promoted.

Many in our society now raise the question of whether parents should be limited in the number of children they can have (e.g., population control policies). Advances in medical technology allowing doctors to diagnose diseases in utero raise the question of selective abortion to ensure that a “less than normal” child does not enter the world. The desire for “well-born” children has brought a new branch of medicine to the forefront. Behind those concepts is the practice of eugenics.

What should be our response biblically? We must not lose sight of the value and dignity of the individual human being. We see from Scripture that we are all created with the purpose to glorify God (1 Cor 6:20; 10:31; Rev 4:11). We all have value to God (Matt 12:11–12) and salvation is made available to all types of people regardless of perceived value by the culture (Gal 3:28). Finally, from the womb to the grave, God sees us each as individuals of value and significance (Psalm 139:13–16).

North Carolina was right to acknowledge their responsibility in devaluing the dignity of the individual. Does $50,000 restore that dignity? No. Is the state right in offering some kind of reparations to the victims? Most likely, yes. Have we moved beyond this as a society? Certainly not. We need a biblical perspective of the value and dignity of the individual human being made in the image of God. Without this, we will probably walk down this road again, just in a different form.

_________________________

Tommy Tomlinson, “N.C. task force recommends $50,000 for eugenics victims,” Charlotte Observer, January 11, 2012.

Stanley J. Grenz and Jay T. Smith, Pocket Dictionary of Ethics (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2003).

Paul A. Lombard, “Eugenics,” in The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Ethics, eds., James F. Childress and John Macquarrie (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986), 209–10.

Sanctity of Human Life

~ Evan Lenow

This Sunday is Sanctity of Human Life Sunday in the Southern Baptist Convention. In addition, this month marks the 39th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision that opened the door for legalized abortion in the United States. At this time each year, Southern Baptists and other pro-life organizations take a moment to reflect on the tragedy of abortion in our society.

Roe v. Wade is one of the few Supreme Court decisions that most Americans know by name. While many of the more famous decisions represent crucial moments in American history for the rights of the oppressed (Brown v. Board of Education, etc.), Roe v. Wade stands as a blight on American history for the resulting carnage of the abortion industry since January 22, 1973.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, 22% of all pregnancies (excluding miscarriages) end in abortion. Eighteen percent of women who have abortions are teenagers, and more than half are in their twenties. Between 1973 and 2008 (the most recent year for reported statistics), nearly 50 million legal abortions have taken place. In 2008 alone, there were 1.21 million abortions.

The Guttmacher Institute also reports some of the reasons for abortion, stating:

The reasons women give for having an abortion underscore their understanding of the responsibilities of parenthood and family life. Three-fourths of women cite concern for or responsibility to other individuals; three-fourths say they cannot afford a child; three-fourths say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or the ability to care for dependents; and half say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner.

The number of abortions in the United States is staggering—50 million in 39 years. These are 50 million lives that were ended. These were 50 million individual persons whose opportunity to develop, live, and thrive was taken from them all in the name of a right to privacy.

In an interesting turn of events on the political spectrum, the Guttmacher Institute reports that states enacted more provisions restricting abortion in 2011 than in any other year. Ninety-two legal provisions placing some level of restriction on abortion access were implemented in 24 states. These restrictions include waiting periods, limitation on insurance coverage, and the requirement to show an ultrasound before an abortion. In Texas, a law was passed requiring that doctors shows patients a sonogram of their unborn babies prior to performing an abortion. Even though opponents are challenging the law in court, a federal appeals court ruled that the law can be enforced while facing further legal challenges.

Perhaps the most fundamental issue in the abortion debate is the question of personhood. Proponents of abortion rights often define personhood in an operational sense, whereby an individual human being is a “person” when he can perform specific functions. These functions typically include conscious awareness of surroundings, reasoning, communication, and self-awareness. The problem with this type of definition is that it not only denies personhood to the unborn, but it also denies personhood to infants, those severely incapacitated by injury or disease, and some individuals at the end of life. By such standards, those individuals could be eliminated because they are not “persons.”

In contrast, personhood is best understood in a substantive sense. In this type of definition, personhood is granted based on the existence of human life. If human life exists, then personhood is established. From a theological standpoint, we can view personhood as an extension of the imago Dei (Genesis 1:26–27). Therefore, since all humans are created in the image of God, then all humans are persons. Since new human life begins at conception, personhood is present from the earliest stages of life.

As we reflect on the sanctity of life, consider the following verses. In Genesis 1:26–27, God declares, “Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” Jeremiah 1:5 states, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” In Psalm 139:15-16, David writes, “My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth; Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; and in Your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them.”

May we treasure life in the womb and work to show how these tiniest individuals are persons—made in the image of God.

_________________________

Guttmacher Institute, “Facts on Induced Abortion in the United States,” August 2011.

Guttmacher Institute, “States Enact Record Number of Abortion Restrictions in 2011,” January 5, 2012.

Chris Tomlinson, “Texas abortion law can be enforced, court rules,” Star-Telegram, January 10, 2012.

For more study on the issue of abortion, the following resources are helpful:

“Issues at a Glance: Life,” Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, www.erlc.com/life

Francis J. Beckwith, Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007)

John S. Feinberg and Paul D. Feinberg, Ethics for a Brave New World, 2nd ed. (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010)

*This post was first published at www.theologicalmatters.com.