By James Wilson
It was a shockingly gross violation of the First Amendment when California’s Department of Managed Health Care ordered churches to pay for abortions wanted by their employees. Alliance Defending Freedom has filed a civil liberties lawsuit on behalf of three Southern California churches, but the mandate is not just unconstitutional. It flies in the face of recent Supreme Court rulings striking down regulations requiring abortion coverage that conflict with religious faith. It also violates federal rules prohibiting states receiving federal funds from requiring abortion coverage in a benefits package whether or not faith is an issue.
Of course it should be no shock in our time to discover government is the most lawless constituency in the land. My prayer is this lawsuit more than succeeds; may it set state government flat on its back with heads rolling over the wasted public funds spent defending it.
Taking matters in reverse order, the suit should succeed because of the very lawlessness of government at all levels, though it may fail for that reason. ADF filed a complaint with the feds when state bureaucrats ruled in August 2014. Although the mandate is a clear violation of federal rules the national bureaucrats sided with their state-based cousins, and ADF then sued. Attorneys called the state action nothing short of strong-arming and one pastor represented in the suit vowed he would go to jail before he would pay for abortions. The first issue is simplicity itself; government under the 14th Amendment is required to follow its own rules. Yet this doctrine is nothing more than a piece of paper until hundreds of thousands of professing Christians – and otherwise freedom-loving Americans – show the courage of Pastor Jack Hibbs. Our constitution is not paper under glass in Philadelphia; it is literally we the people.
The second issue is as simple. Are we a nation of laws or of men in power with big guns behind them? Officials at all levels and all political persuasions love to tout the US Supreme Court as the ultimate arbiter of law in our land. The Court – beginning with Hobby Lobby case – has repeatedly ruled in Obamacare litigation that government cannot force people to violate their faith to provide abortion coverage to employees. Yet California’s Department of Managed Health Care issued their edict in the full knowledge they were violating the law as interpreted by their beloved SCOTUS. The bureaucrats know their resources are orders of magnitude above those of their victims. They can do as they please for as long as it takes to navigate the full court press of the court system. It is time they were pressed down like olives pressed for their oil.
Most potent is the constitutional issue itself. The First Amendment is clear that government may not encroach on freedom to hold, teach, and practice religious faith subject – except in extraordinary cases – to nothing but the dictates of the conscience of the practitioner. Courts have held that where a compelling public purpose presents faith may be restricted. For example, polygamy, child abuse, and snake handling are fair game for government even if the religious exemption is claimed; healthy families, safety for children, and public health are compelling in their urgency. Since no one is preventing anyone from obtaining an abortion – churches are simply refusing to pay for them – there is no legitimate government interest is at stake. We have state policy clashing with faith tenet; state and federal Constitutions say faith trumps government – and the state bureaucrats know this if they passed high school classes in American government. This suit should succeed in reversing the ruling and pinning back bureaucratic ears.
Our rights are not granted by Constitution; they are gifted by God and recognized in Constitution as sourcing a higher Power. These issues seem political, and politics is either beneath the spirit realm or more pragmatic – depending on whom we question. But this higher Power presents Himself as Person – a Person passionately concerned and involved with people where they live and work. This Person says He came that we might have abundant life – right here – and feeds our physical hunger for bread and wine – at picnics and weddings – as readily as He feeds our hearts with precepts and concepts. He calls us to honor those in authority at the same time He sometimes calls us to sue and defy them. He calls us to forget what our comfort zone used to look like. He says this because (Luke 12:32) He deeply desires to give us His Kingdom right here on earth.
That is worth whatever sacrifice of personal comfort may be required.
James A. Wilson is the author of Living As Ambassadors of Relationships, The Holy Spirit and the End Times, and Kingdom in Pursuit – available at local bookstores or by e-mailing him at praynorthstate@charter.net
