11/15/11: US Catholic Bishops Target Same Sex Marriage
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US Roman Catholic Bishops opened meetings in Baltimore this week. Among the bishops’ top concerns are religious exemptions in states that legalize same-sex marriage. In Illinois, government officials stopped working with Catholic Charities on adoptions and foster-care placements after 40 years because the agency refused to recognize a new civil union law. Illinois bishops are suing the state.
In New York, the bishops, along with Orthodox Jewish leaders and others, have complained that the religious exception in this year’s law allowing gay marriage is too weak to be effective.
On health care, the bishops have been pressing the Health and Human Services Department for a broader religious exception to the provision in Obamacare that mandates private insurers pay for contraception.