Deputy Editorial Page Editor

First, a word about what this weeks column is not about.

Its not about whether Obamacare is the best prescription to cure the drawbacks and disparities in Americas health-care system.

Its not about policy buzzwords like individual mandates, risk pools or severability.

Its about just one question: Can the government order its citizens to act against their religious faith?

You probably thought that question had been answered more than 200 years ago. The Founding Fathers hammered out the First Amendment to the Constitution ensuring the free exercise of religion without government meddling.

The White House thinks otherwise.

PRESIDENT OBAMAS health-care initiative includes a mandate directed at religiously affiliated employers and their health providers. They must offer insurance coverage for contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs such as the morning-after pill.

In the words of John Garvey, president of the Catholic University of America: Its like compelling Jehovahs Witnesses to salute the flag, or Quakers to fight, or Jews to eat pork.

Of course such a mandate runs utterly contrary to the Catholic Churchs unwavering respect for human life. Its an unshakable pillar of Catholic faith and a component of its formidable care network 56 Catholic health-care systems nationwide, whose hospitals employ more than 750,000 workers. One in six U.S. patients regardless of faith are treated in Catholic hospitals.

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Health-care mandate is unhealthy for religious expression