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Washington D.C., Aug 3, 2017 / 04:21 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A Senate proposal for immigration limits backed by President Donald Trump would hurt family unity and exclude too many vulnerable people, the U.S. Catholic bishops have said.

“Had this discriminatory legislation been in place generations ago, many of the very people who built and defended this nation would have been excluded,” said Bishop Joe S. Vasquez of Austin, the chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Migration.

Bishop Vasquez voiced strong opposition to the legislation introduced by Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and David Perdue (R-Ga.). The proposed bill is called the Reforming American Immigration for a Strong Economy Act, also known as the RAISE Act.

The legislation announced on Wednesday would cut by half the number of legal immigrants the U.S. accepts each year. It would limit green cards for foreign nationals seeking to reunite with their families, and halve the number of refugees allowed to enter the country. The diversity visa lottery, which gives visas to countries with low rates of immigration to the U.S., would also be eliminated, National Public Radio reports.

“The United States supports families and should not throw up obstacles to their unity,” Bishop Vasquez said Aug. 2, charging that the legislation “would have our nation turn its back on this long and storied tradition of welcoming families setting out to build a better life.”

The bishops objected to the permanent cap on the number of refugees who are allowed safe passage through the country, saying this would prevent the flexibility needed to respond to humanitarian crises.

“As a Church, we believe the stronger the bonds of family, the greater a person’s chance of succeeding in life. The RAISE Act imposes a definition of family that would weaken those bonds,” Bishop Vasquez said.

The bishops urged the Senate to reject the measure and asked Congress and the president to enact comprehensive immigration reform.

“I believe that such reform must recognize the many contributions that immigrants of all backgrounds have made to our nation, and must protect the lives and dignity of all, including the most vulnerable,” said Bishop Vasquez.

President Donald Trump said the bill would reduce poverty, increase wages, and save “billions and billions of dollars” in taxpayer money. The bill would bar new arrivals from receiving welfare.

The president said the proposal would favor applicants “who can speak English, financially support themselves and their families, and demonstrate skills that will contribute to our economy.”

The prospects for the bill’s success are not clear and at least two Republican senators are likely opponents, National Public Radio reports.

[…]

St. Louis, Mo., Aug 3, 2017 / 02:56 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The classic ceremonial hats and capes of Fourth Degree members of the Knights of Columbus that you may have seen at Mass or at parish events will now be getting a major alteration.

“This f… […]

Washington D.C., Aug 3, 2017 / 03:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- A leading Democratic Party campaigner has signaled openness to pro-life candidates, continuing months of controversy over the party’s future.

Rep. Ben Ray Lujan (D-N.M.), who chairs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in charge of helping Democratic congressional candidates, told The Hill there would be no “litmus test” for candidates on abortion when it comes to funding their campaigns.

The comments drew support from Kristen Day, executive director of Democrats for Life of America.

“We have been advocating for years that the Democratic Party needs to open itself up to the viewpoints of more than 20 million pro-life Democrats,” Day said Aug. 1.

“Our party, which advocates for diversity and inclusion, has been sending mixed messages about inclusion for its pro-life members,” said Day, adding the statement shows “that Democrats are serious about winning again.”

Democrats for Life cited the loss of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, traditionally strong Democratic states, in the 2016 presidential election. The states are “very pro-life,” the organization said.

Lujan’s remarks focused on winning a majority of 218 votes in the House of Representatives, which would require winning 24 seats in the 2018 elections.

“There is not a litmus test for Democratic candidates,” he told TheHill.com. “As we look at candidates across the country, you need to make sure you have candidates that fit the district, that can win in these districts across America.”

“We’ll need a broad coalition to get that done,” he said. “We are going to need all of that, we have to be a big family in order to win the House back.”

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List and an advisor to the Donald Trump 2016 presidential campaign, said the Democratic party’s official abortion stand has cost it.

“Democrats’ extreme pro-abortion platform has lost more votes than it has gained and led to defeat in the last two election cycles,” she said, citing a Gallup poll reporting that 32 percent of Democrats consider themselves pro-life.

At the same time, Dannenfelser said Lujan’s comments are “not the same as concrete policy endorsements.”

“Only changes in the party platform that represent majority views and momentum, like that of the Pain-Capable bill, will signify true change,” she said, referring to a bill that bars abortion when the unborn child is believed to feel pain.

Pro-abortion rights groups, however, criticized Lujan’s comments and downplayed any claimed advantage in backing pro-life candidates.

NARAL Pro-Choice America national campaigns director Mitchell Stille rejected as “sadly mistaken” any claim that President Trump and Republican candidates won in 2016 because of opposition to abortion.

The Democratic Party’s abortion support was a focus of controversy in the early 2017 campaign of Health Mello, a Democratic candidate for mayor of Omaha, Neb.
 
In mid-April former Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez publicly supported Mello. Mello had supported abortion restrictions in the past as a state senator, and was endorsed by Nebraska Right to Life in 2012, but received a 100 percent rating from Planned Parenthood Voters of Nebraska in 2015.

Mello had pledged not to do anything as mayor that would restrict “access to reproductive health care.” Nonetheless, pro-abortion rights groups like NARAL Pro-Choice America criticized the Perez and Sanders endorsements as “politically stupid.”

DNC chair Tom Perez responded to criticism by appearing to strongly reject any openness to pro-life candidates.

“Every Democrat, like every American, should support a woman’s right to make her own choices about her body and her health,” he said April 21. “This is not negotiable and should not change city by city or state by state.”

At the time, a DNC aide told The Hill this statement did not represent a litmus test.

Dannenfelser said Aug. 1 that some Democrats are starting to recognize their vulnerability on abortion, even though “abortion lobby leaders are beside themselves over the mere suggestion that a pro-life Democrat be permitted to run.”

In 2006, the last time the Democrats won the House of Representatives from Republican control, the party recruited and supported several pro-life Democrats.

[…]

St. Louis, Mo., Aug 2, 2017 / 03:20 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Service to the poor on the peripheries of society was a theme of the 2017 Knights of Columbus States Dinner held Tuesday evening in St. Louis.

“I stand before you in deep gratitude for your love and concern for hearing the cry of the poor,” Fr. Gerard Hammond, M.M. told those in attendance at the States Dinner at the annual Knights of Columbus international convention Aug. 1.

“May we always embrace those who need our mercy and compassion.”

Fr. Hammond, a Maryknoll missionary to North Korea, received the Gaudium et Spes Award from Supreme Knight Carl Anderson at the dinner.

The award, named after Vatican II’s pastoral constitution on the Church in the modern world, is the highest honor bestowed by the Knights of Columbus and is given to persons “for their exemplary contributions to the realization of the message of faith and service in the spirit of Christ.”

St. Theresa of Calcutta was the first person to receive the award in 1992. On the award medal is an image of Venerable Fr. Michael McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, comforting a widow and an orphan.

The Knights of Columbus is a worldwide Catholic men’s organization founded in 1882 by Fr. McGivney “to strengthen the faith of Catholic men” and to “protect their families,” in the words of Supreme Knight and CEO Carl Anderson. Since its founding it has grown into an international organization with over 1.9 million members.

This week, around 2,000 Knights from North and South America, Africa, Asia, and Europe meet in St. Louis for the 135th international convention. The theme of this year’s convention is “Convinced of God’s Love and Power.”

Fr. Hammond received his award for his missionary work in North Korea. He has made 50 trips into the country since 1995 to treat patients with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis.

Although he is not allowed by the North Korean government to proselytize, he still tries carry out his priestly mission through serving the sick as an “apostle of peace” and to bring “hope for the voiceless.”

Archbishop William Lori of Baltimore, introducing Fr. Hammond at the dinner, said that in the spirit of Gaudium et Spes, Fr. Hammond “has taken upon himself the ‘griefs and anxieties’ of those who are ‘poor and afflicted,’ as he seeks to share with them, through compassionate action, the ‘joys and hopes’ of faith in Jesus Christ.”

Fr. Hammond has “exemplified the call of Pope Francis to go to the peripheries,” Archbishop Lori said.

“God’s heart has a special place for the poor, so much so that he himself ‘became poor’,” the archbishop said. “The entire history of our redemption is marked by the presence of the poor.”

Later on Tuesday evening, Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, Archbishop Emeritus of Krakow and former personal secretary to Pope St. John Paul II, praised the Knights for spreading the messages of mercy and the Gospel all over the world.

“The Knights of Columbus embraced the message of Divine Mercy proclaimed by the Pope from Kraków, and they proclaim this message in a world affected by various forms of injustice and violence,” he said in his remarks at the dinner.

Pope Francis has taught us to see to see “the other,” our neighbor,” as a “gift,” Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, president of the U.S. bishops’ conference, said on Tuesday at the dinner.   

In the parable of the Good Samaritan, he said that the two men who passed by the wounded man were “looking to self-interest, looking to other things.” The Good Samaritan, however, “tosses aside any consideration except love of neighbor. His help and generosity is excessive.”

Furthermore, he said, Christ teaches that “there is no more boundary when it comes to ‘who are you neighbor to’?” The Knights of Columbus live this teaching out, he said, helping everyone – the immigrant, the refugee, or the Christian displaced from their home.

Cardinal DiNardo also urged those in attendance to join in solidarity with Eastern Rite Catholics who are fasting before the Great Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God. He asked Latin rite Catholics to pray and fast for persecuted Christians in the days leading up to the Assumption.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Vatican sent a message to the convention assuring those in attendance of the “good wishes” and prayers of Pope Francis.

“The Holy Father has often observed that in our own day a new world war is being fought piecemeal, as an ungodly thirst for power and domination, whether economic, political, or military, is leading to untold violence, injustice and suffering in our human family,” Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican Secretary of State, said in his written message delivered at the opening business session of the convention.

Pope Francis, he said, “has asked Christians everywhere, truly convinced of the infinite power of God’s love, to reject this mentality and to combat the growth of a global culture of indifference that discards the least of our brothers and sisters.”

Cardinal Parolin asked the Knights to “respond generously to this challenge” through working for the “sanctification of the world from within” in their lay vocation.

He also noted Pope Francis’ appreciation for the Knights upholding “the sanctity of marriage and the dignity and beauty of family life,” as well as the organization’s aid to persecuted Christians in the Middle East.

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St. Louis, Mo., Aug 2, 2017 / 10:10 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Knights of Columbus on Tuesday announced it will raise and donate $2 million to re-settle Iraqi Christian families displaced by the Islamic State in their home town of Karemlesh on the Nineveh Plain.

“The terrorists desecrated churches and graves and looted and destroyed homes,” Carl Anderson, Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus, said in his Aug. 1 remarks announcing the $2 million project.

“Now we will ensure that hundreds of Christian families driven from their homes can return to these two locations and help to ensure a pluralistic future for Iraq,” he said. In order for Iraq to have such a future, he said Christians must be treated as “free and equal citizens” and not suffer the “religious apartheid” of previous years.

Anderson addressed the 135th annual convention of the Knights of Columbus held in St. Louis, Mo. Aug.1-3. 90 bishops and 12 cardinals were present, along with Knights councils from all over the world.

The Knights of Columbus is an international Catholic men’s organization founded, in Anderson’s words, to “strengthen the faith of Catholic men” and “protect their families.” Over 1.9 million are members of the organization, founded in 1882 by Venerable Fr. Michael J. McGivney.

The four pillars of the organization are charity, unity, fraternity, and patriotism.

An international aid organization as well, the Knights’ Christian Refugee Relief Fund has provided over $13 million in aid to persecuted Christians since 2014, mostly in Iraq and Syria. In 2014, forces of the Islamic State overran large swathes of Syria and Iraq, killing or displacing many Christian families.

The group has since been forced back, losing much of its territory, including the Nineveh Plain where many Christians lived.

Around 1.5 million Christians lived in Iraq before the U.S. invasion in 2003, but that number has fallen to below an estimated 250,000. The situation for Iraqi Christians is so dire, Anderson said, that “without substantial assistance” in the next two months, many of them might leave Iraq for good.

Christians have lived in the area for centuries, tracing their communities back to almost the beginning of Christianity. Some speak Aramaic, the language Jesus would have spoken, and various ancient shrines existed in the region, including the tomb of the prophet Jonah which was destroyed by Islamic State.

“These Christian communities are a priceless treasure for the Church and for humanity,” Anderson said on Tuesday. He called the Knights’ drive to raise money for them a “concrete step” to aid the beleaguered Christians.

The amount of $2 million would also match the donation of the government of Hungary, which has helped resettle around 1,000 families in the Iraqi village of Telskuf.

The Knights will partner with the Chaldean Archeparchy of Erbil to help rebuild Karemlesh, which is just 18 miles east of Mosul.

Anderson said that while the town was controlled by Islamic State, homes were vandalized or destroyed and churches were desecrated. “We will give them and many others hope for the future,” he said.

The Knights will also partner with the U.S. bishops’ conference to sponsor a national day of prayer and a “week of awareness” for persecuted Christians, starting Nov. 26.

Those wishing to make a tax-deductible donation to the project for Karemlesh can do so at www.ChristiansAtRisk.org, or by phone at 1-800-694-5713. 100 percent of the donations will go to the project.

In his annual address, Anderson noted other work the Knights had accomplished, including more than $177 million in donations and over 75 million volunteer hours.

Local Knights councils had responded to various disasters and tragedies, including providing drinking water and sandbags to families in Louisiana after over 60,000 homes had been flooded by record rainfall, Anderson said. The Knights provided more than $100,000 in emergency relief after Hurricane Matthew caused hundreds of deaths and billions of dollars in damage in the Caribbean and the United States.

The Knights also worked to provide for the spiritual life of families, he said, as the family which Fr. McGivney grew up in “was a true domestic Church.”

He said that Knights councils had organized pilgrimages in various dioceses for the Jubilee Year of Mercy, and had introduced a spiritual program for men based on a pastoral letter by Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix, “Into the Breach.”

Knights had also organized “Warriors to Lourdes” pilgrimages, taking wounded veteran soldiers to the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes for healing.

Anderson called the Knights to stand against the “polite persecution” of secular society, quoting Pope Francis.

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Washington D.C., Aug 2, 2017 / 03:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Researchers in Oregon have announced that they have successfully altered genes in a human embryo for the first time in the United States, but Catholic ethicists warn that the procedure was morally objectionable for many reasons.

“Very young humans have been created in vitro and treated not as ends, but as mere means or research fodder to achieve particular investigative goals,” said Fr. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, Director of Education for the The National Catholic Bioethics Center, in a statement to CNA.

“Their value as human beings is profoundly denigrated every time they are created, experimented upon, and then killed. Moreover, if such embryos were to grow up, as will doubtless occur in the future, there are likely to be unintended effects from modifying their genes,” Fr. Pacholczyk continued.

A team of scientists led by Shoukhrat Mitalipov at Oregon Health and Science University announced this week that they used a technology known as CRISPR to edit sections of the human genome, performing the procedure on embryonic humans. The technology, which selectively “snips” and trims areas of the genome and replaces it with strands of desired DNA, has previously been used on adult humans and other species.

Researchers in China have also announced that they have used the technology on embryos, but the edited genes were only present in some of the embryonic subject’s cells.

While researchers laud the breakthrough as a step towards the birth of genetically modified humans and the potential ability to treat inherited genetic diseases, the embryonic humans created and tested in both the US and Chinese experiments were all destroyed within a few days of the procedure. If allowed to survive, the subject embryos would have carried the edits they received in their own egg and sperm cells, and thus have the ability to pass those edited genes down to future generations.

CNA also spoke to John DiCamillo, an ethicist at the National Catholic Bioethics Center, in February about CRISPR technology more broadly, and the ethics surrounding the technique. He stressed that while Catholics “need to be attentive to where the dangers are” surrounding CRISPR technology generally, he cautioned Catholics not to “automatically consider any kind of gene editing to be automatically a problem.”

He pointed to gene therapy trials for disorders such as sickle cell disease and cancer that show promise for treating difficult disorders. He also noted that there “could be limited situations that could exist where the germ line could be legitimately edited. In other words, making changes to sperm, to eggs, or to early embryos as a way of potentially addressing diseases – inheritable diseases and so forth.”

However, permitting edits to germ line cells – such as embryos, eggs, and sperm – could also be “very dangerous on multiple levels,” DiCamillo warned. Since the technology is so new, patients or their descendants could experience a range of “unintended, perhaps harmful, side effects that can now be transmitted, inherited by other individuals down the line.” An embryo who experiences gene modification could also carry and pass on edited genes.

Echoing similar concerns, Fr. Pacholczyk pointing as well to the guidance from the National Academies of Sciences’ 2017 report on human gene editing. In the report, he said, the scientists point out that this kind of gene editing is controversial “precisely because the resulting genetic changes would be inherited by the next generation, and the technology therefore would cross a line many have viewed as ethically inviolable.”

Fr. Pacholczyk  also stressed the importance of limiting gene editing to therapeutic purposes, with the subject’s best interests in mind. He stated that human beings should never be subjected to the research without themselves or their guardians being offered informed consent and without the treatment being ordered to the patient’s health and healing.

In the cases in Oregon, however, the parents of the children created were not able to give valid consent because ethical consent “by definition excludes any approval of directly causing their death or otherwise using [subjects] as mere means to an end.”

“These experiments were nontherapeutic, as the goal was ultimately to destroy the embryos,” Fr. Pacholczyk continued. “Consent is particularly important when dealing with very vulnerable research subjects, and human embryos are among the most vulnerable of God’s creatures.”

Currently, Food and Drug Administration regulations require that all embryos who experience gene editing are later destroyed.

Furthermore, to be ethical, any applications or experiments utilizing CRISPR or other gene editing technology cannot use any other methods in its process which are themselves intrinsically immoral, Fr.Pacholczyk said. The Catholic Church forbids immoral methods of removing spermatozoa and ova from the body outside of intercourse and conception of new human beings through in vitro methods because both techniques dissociate procreation from the integrally personal context of the conjugal act.

[…]

Denver, Colo., Aug 2, 2017 / 12:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Star-gazing might not be the first thing that comes to mind when Catholics think of St. Lawrence, the early Christian martyr who was cooked to death by the Romans on an outdoor grill.

But every August, Catholics have the chance to see a meteor shower named in his honor.

The Perseids meteor shower, also called the “tears of St. Lawrence,” is a meteor shower associated with the comet Swift-Tuttle, which drops dust and debris in Earth’s orbit on its 133-year trip around the Sun. (The comet poses no immediate threat to Earth, at least not for several thousand years.)

As Earth orbits the Sun, it hits pieces of left-behind debris from the comet, causing them to burn up in Earth’s atmosphere.

This creates a prolific meteor shower that can best be seen in the Northern Hemisphere from late July to early August, usually peaking around Aug. 10, the feast of St. Lawrence.  

During it’s peak, the rate of meteors reaches 60 or more per hour.

The name “Perseids” comes from the constellation Perseus, named for a character in Greek mythology, and the radiant of the shower or the point from which it appears to originate.

The name “tears of St. Lawrence” came from the association with his feast day and from the legends that built up around the Saint after his death.

Saint Lawrence was martyred on Aug. 10, 258 during the persecution of the emperor Valerian along with many other members of the Roman clergy. He was the last of the seven deacons of Rome to die.

After the pope, Sixtus II, was martyred on Aug. 6, Lawrence became the principal authority of the Roman Church, having been the Church’s treasurer.

When he was summoned before the executioners, Lawrence was ordered to bring all the wealth of the Church with him. He showed up with a handful of crippled, poor, and sick men, and when questioned, replied that “These are the true wealth of the Church.”

He was immediately sent to his death, being cooked alive on a gridiron. Legend has it that one of his last words was a joke about his method of execution, as he quipped to his killers: “Turn me over, I’m done on this side!”

Catholics began calling the meteors the “tears of St. Lawrence,” even though the celestial phenomenon pre-dates the saint.

Some Italian lore also holds that the fiery bits of debris seen during a meteor shower are representative of the coals that killed St. Lawrence, and some traditions hold it that if one waters a basil plant and sets it out on the night of the meteor shower, they will find coal chips underneath the plant next day from St. Lawrence’s tears.

Anyone in the Northern Hemisphere should be able to view the “tears of St. Lawrence” best after midnight on Aug. 11-12 this year. The meteors will shower from various points in the sky rather than from one particular direction.

For the best viewing, it is recommended to go to a rural area away from light pollution.

[…]

Montgomery, Ala., Aug 1, 2017 / 04:43 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A federal judge has struck down an Alabama law requiring more scrutiny for minors who seek an abortion without parental consent.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan Russ Walker said that the law governing judicial bypass requests unconstitutionally imposes an undue burden on a minor who seeks an abortion. She said the law violates the minor’s confidentiality by possibly bringing other people from her life into the process, the Associated Press reports.

The State of Alabama had argued the law would allow a meaningful inquiry to judge the minor’s maturity while providing a “confidential, and expeditious option for a teenager who seeks an abortion without parental consent.” Other backers of the law said it helped give guidance to the minor.

State law requires minors who can’t secure parental consent for abortion to seek court permission. The 2014 law modified the process to allow a judge to appoint a guardian “for the interests of the unborn child.” The law allows the local district attorney to call witnesses and question the girl to determine her maturity level. If the minor’s parents or guardians learn of the hearing they may also be involved.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama had filed the lawsuit in 2014 on behalf of the Montgomery abortion clinic Reproductive Health Services.

Judge Walker cited the case of a 12-year-old pregnant girl who had been raped by a relative. She was 13 weeks pregnant when she went before a family court judge, who approved the abortion on June 27. The district attorney appealed the decision on the grounds the fifth grader was not mature enough to make an informed decision. On July 12 the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals ruled in the girl’s favor.

The judge said that a minor seeking permission for abortion could face both a lawyer appointed for the unborn baby and the chief prosecutor in her county, who is “empowered by the act to represent the state’s public policy to protect unborn life, and backed by substantial state resources.”

The Alabama attorney general’s office said it is reviewing the decision.

[…]

Santa Rosa, Calif., Aug 1, 2017 / 03:58 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The impact of Our Lady of Guadalupe on the Americas should encourage Christians in the U.S. to continue to evangelize, even when their country seems headed in the wrong direction, Archbishop … […]

Denver, Colo., Aug 1, 2017 / 03:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After the US Department of Justice did not drop its appeal of a contraceptive mandate lawsuit by the Catholic Benefits Association on Monday, the group expressed its disappointment.

“It is disappointing that that process hasn’t moved forward. It does seem to be stalled currently,” Douglas Wilson, CEO of the Catholic Benefits Association, told CNA Tuesday.

Catholic Benefits Association is comprised of over 700 Catholic employers, including dioceses, schools, hospitals, and social service agencies. The group helps the employers provide quality Catholic health care in accordance with Church teaching.

The association had previously asked the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice to drop the government’s appeal of their lawsuit against the HHS contraceptive mandate. The Tenth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals gave the government until July 31 to reply to CBA’s request.

In a July 27 statement, Wilson said that “President Trump took an important first step by instructing these agencies to change their mandate and to protect religious liberty.”

“HHS and DOJ need to follow President Trump’s lead by dropping their appeal by July 31,” he said.

CBA had filed a motion in court asking either for “summary affirmance” of its claim that the HHS contraceptive mandate was illegal, or for the administration to drop its appeal of the case.

The Department of Justice was given until July 31 by the Tenth Circuit Court to reply, and said on Monday that it was still working on a final rule on exemptions from the contraceptive mandate.

Wilson said on Tuesday that the CBA wants the administration “to get those interim regulations filed and promulgated as soon as possible.”

The Catholic Benefits Association is one of dozens of non-profit organizations which sued the Department of Health and Human Services during the Obama administration over the contraceptive mandate and its “accommodation” offered to objecting entities.

While the mandate ordered employers to provide cost-free coverage in their employee health plans for contraceptives, sterilizations, and abortion-inducing drugs, the government offered an “accommodation” to non-profits that conscientiously objected to complying with the mandate. They would notify the government or the third party administrator of their plan of their objection, and their administrator would then provide the coverage to the employees.

Many non-profits, including the Archdiocese of Washington and the Little Sisters of the Poor, claimed that this “accommodation” still forced them to cooperate with morally-objectionable practices of providing access to contraceptives.

Last year, in the middle of the contraceptive mandate case Zubik v. Burwell, the Supreme Court sent the case back to the lower courts and directed both parties to come to an agreement where the interests of the government – providing coverage for contraceptives and the other drugs and procedures – were respected, while the religious liberty of objecting parties was also respected.

However, even under the Trump administration the Department of Justice had not stopped its appeals of the HHS mandate cases. On May 4, however, President Donald Trump announced that, as part of his religious freedom executive order, the objecting religious non-profits would receive relief from the mandate.

He told the non-profits and the nuns present from the Little Sisters of the Poor that “your long ordeal will soon be over” and that “we are ending the attacks on your religious freedom.”

HHS Secretary Tom Price said the agency “will be taking action in short order to follow the President’s instruction to safeguard the deeply held religious beliefs of Americans who provide health insurance to their employees.”

A draft interim final rule from the HHS was leaked in May, which reportedly carved out religious exemptions from the mandate for the objecting non-profits that were more broad than the narrow exemptions determined by the Obama administration, which applied to churches and very few other religious groups.

Becket, a religious freedom law firm defending many of the objectors to the HHS mandate, said the language in the draft would offer sufficient protections from the mandate for the religious groups.

In the draft, the government also admitted in the draft that the contraceptive mandate did not advance a compelling governmental interest, which is one of the necessary qualifications for a law that infringes upon someone’s sincere religious beliefs to succeed the test, under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

However, the administration’s rule has not yet been released. The Catholic Benefits Association finally filed a motion in court asking the government to drop its appeal of the HHS mandate case, and citing the government’s admission in the draft rule that the mandate did not further a “compelling governmental interest.”

The court gave the government a July 31 deadline to reply to the motion. On Monday, the Department of Justice replied that the administration was still in the process of crafting the final rule for religious non-profits and the contraceptive mandate, and asked the court to suspend the motion until the process was finished.

“As we explained in our status report of July 14, 2017, the new Administration has initiated the rulemaking process to amend the regulations at issue here,” the agency said on Monday. “That process has not, however, reached conclusion. This Court has properly maintained abeyances in related cases while the rulemaking process proceeds, and it should do the same here.”

In response, Wilson said that “the Tenth Circuit made clear that it wanted the government’s response to address ‘with specificity’ the arguments in our motion, which of course they have not done to date.”

The agency had initially requested from CBA an extension to reply to the motion, which CBA would have opposed, Wilson said. However, later on Monday, the agency instead filed a short brief in response to the motion.

“We’re disappointed in that all of the facts come to our side of the equation, they favor our argument,” Wilson said. He said that “we’re very heartened that the response that they filed is in our opinion lacking in substance, and we feel hopeful that the court’s going to see it the same way.”

[…]