During an interview on Fox News Sunday, Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington DC scuttled rumors of dissension in the ranks of U.S. bishops regarding the recently filed lawsuit challenging President Barack Obama’s birth control mandate.
“I have yet to see among the bishops any split at all,” Wuerl told Fox host Chris Wallace. “The bishop who was quoted saying he was concerned issued a statement saying that was not his position.”
The bishop in question, Bishop Stephen Blair of Stockton, California, recently expressed concern about the strategy of the lawsuit, comments which were misconstrued by the press to mean that he was not in support of the filing.
In a statement clarifying the remarks, Bishop Blair confirmed: “I stand solidly with my brother bishops in our common resolve to overturn the unacceptable intrusion of government into the life of the Church by the HHS Mandate.”
He went on to say that from his perspective, “the recent legal challenges by dioceses and Catholic entities throughout the United States, as well as discussions with the Administration, and the advocacy of Congress, all have one essential goal: to defend the right of the Church to define herself and to preserve the identity and integrity of the Catholic ministries exercised through her institutions.
“I am convinced we need to continue to seek to persuade others to join us in this just cause through reasoned, civil and respectful discussion.”
As all of the bishops have repeatedly insisted, the fundamental issue is not about access to contraception, but rather the freedom of the Church to carry out her mission as given by Christ.
“Religious Freedom protects the right of the Church to define herself and her ministries. It is totally unacceptable to have the federal government decide that our religious ministries are not ‘religious’,” Blair said in his statement.
“The continuing effort of the government to intrude itself by re-defining Catholic ministries as somehow less religious or less Catholic because they employ or serve those without regard to their creed is unjust and a violation of religious liberty. The government should not intrude itself in forcing the Church and her institutions to violate her long standing teaching to provide essential health care to her employees.”
He concluded by saying that he was looking forward to the Bishops’ meeting in June where they will discuss the next steps to take to “achieve our common and essential goal of ending this violation of religious freedom.”
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