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Hands off health care, US Catholic group tells bishops

WASHINGTON — A US Catholic group on Friday accused Roman Catholic bishops of meddling in health care reforms by making backroom deals to ensure the bill does not allow funding for abortion. "Religious and ethical concerns can legitimately inform public policy, but the bishops have overstepped the mark," said Jon O'Brien, president of Catholics for Choice. "Interference by the US Catholic bishops in health care reform does not help women. The bishops should not be allowed to use health care reform to restrict women's access to safe and legal reproductive healthcare services," he said. In November, said O'Brien, US Catholic bishops made a "last-minute backroom power play with Representative Bart Stupak" which "derailed meaningful health care reform." Stupak, a Democrat from Michigan, voted for the House of Representatives version of the health care bill last year only after inserting tough language forbidding federal subsidies from going to health plans that offer abortion. The Senate later passed a bill that did not contain the same language and was working with the House to meld the two bills into one when the Democratic party lost its 60-seat Senate super-majority in January, putting health care reforms on hold. This week, President Barack Obama announced a final push to pass the bill under a process expected to use the Senate bill, with some modifications, as the baseline legislation. Stupak said Thursday he and roughly a dozen Democratic allies would block the sweeping legislation if their demands to block funding for abortion are not met. A survey conducted for Catholics for Choice last year showed that 68 percent of US Catholic voters rejected the argument being made by some bishops that Catholics are obliged to oppose health care reform legislation that allows abortion coverage. A majority of Catholics surveyed -- 56 percent -- said they thought the bishops should not take a position on healthcare reform at all.

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-=== Catholic diocese seeks cash to pay Irish victims ===
+=== Hands off health care, US Catholic group tells bishops ===
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+WASHINGTON — A US Catholic group on Friday accused Roman Catholic bishops of meddling in health care reforms by making backroom deals to ensure the bill does not allow funding for abortion.
-DUBLIN — A Roman Catholic diocese at the center of Ireland's child-abuse scandals appealed Tuesday to its parishioners to cover some of its more than euro10 million ($14 million) in bills to victims and lawyers.
+"Religious and ethical concerns can legitimately inform public policy, but the bishops have overstepped the mark," said Jon O'Brien, president of Catholics for Choice.
-Bishop Denis Brennan of Ferns, the southeast Irish diocese that was first to face state investigations into decades of cover-ups involving pedophile priests, spelled out its abuse-related costs Tuesday in a rare admission.
+"Interference by the US Catholic bishops in health care reform does not help women. The bishops should not be allowed to use health care reform to restrict women's access to safe and legal reproductive healthcare services," he said.
-Brennan said the diocese has already paid euro8 million to settle lawsuits from 48 abuse victims. But it has yet to settle 13 pending cases, and also has remortgaged the bishop's residence to cover euro2 million in its own lawyers' bills for defending the church.
+In November, said O'Brien, US Catholic bishops made a "last-minute backroom power play with Representative Bart Stupak" which "derailed meaningful health care reform."
-The diocese's chief financial officer, Eugene Doyle, said the church had no option but to ask its faithful to help foot the bill. He estimated that the diocese's 100,000 members in 80 parishes would be asked to contribute euro60,000 ($85,000) annually for the next 20 years, or euro1.2 million total — but stressed that no money would be taken from normal weekly collections.
+Stupak, a Democrat from Michigan, voted for the House of Representatives version of the health care bill last year only after inserting tough language forbidding federal subsidies from going to health plans that offer abortion.
-The appeal coincides with Ireland's worst recession since the 1930s, with unemployment at a 15-year high of 12.5 percent.
+The Senate later passed a bill that did not contain the same language and was working with the House to meld the two bills into one when the Democratic party lost its 60-seat Senate super-majority in January, putting health care reforms on hold.
-Colm O'Gorman, the former Ferns altar boy whose campaigning pressured the government into investigating pedophile cover-ups in the region, said it was obscene for the church to be seeking funds from the faithful.
+This week, President Barack Obama announced a final push to pass the bill under a process expected to use the Senate bill, with some modifications, as the baseline legislation.
-"The Catholic Church is one of the wealthiest institutions on the planet. Let it be accountable for its gross institutional failures, rather than looking to people who can ill afford to pay for those failures," said O'Gorman, who founded a counseling service for the church's abuse victims and today directs the Irish chapter of Amnesty International.
+Stupak said Thursday he and roughly a dozen Democratic allies would block the sweeping legislation if their demands to block funding for abortion are not met.
-O'Gorman said his 1998 lawsuit against the church — which ultimately forced then-Ferns Bishop Brendan Comiskey to resign — was designed to make the church accountable for its sins, not to impose a bill "on people sitting in pews in Ferns."
+A survey conducted for Catholics for Choice last year showed that 68 percent of US Catholic voters rejected the argument being made by some bishops that Catholics are obliged to oppose health care reform legislation that allows abortion coverage.
-The Ferns diocese says it has received euro5.8 million from the church's Irish fund for abuse settlements, euro1.5 million from insurance policies, euro650,000 from the government to defray legal costs, and euro105,000 from child-abusing priests themselves. It also has run down its own savings accounts and secured a euro1.8 million loan against the bishop's residence.
+A majority of Catholics surveyed -- 56 percent -- said they thought the bishops should not take a position on healthcare reform at all.
-Doyle said this loan has created a 20-year bill costing euro120,000 annually. He said diocesan fundraisers hope that congregations will cover half of this bill.
-Child-abuse scandals have caused exceptional trauma in Ireland, a once-devoutly Catholic nation that until the 1980s exported priests worldwide.
-An Irish government collapsed in 1994 amid arguments over its failure to extradite a pedophile priest to the neighboring British territory of Northern Ireland. A year later the first Irish abuse victims went public with lawsuits against the church.
-Since 2002, a government-organized compensation board has paid out more than euro800 million to 13,000 people who were abused in church-run residential institutions for children and another euro150 million to the victims' lawyers.
-Few of Ireland's 26 dioceses have released any details of abuse lawsuits or settlements. Ferns is the first to offer specifics of its abuse-related finances.
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