Lex Cordis Caritas - The law of the heart is Love

It was disappointing to see a gratuitous slap at the Catholic Church in a column published on April 7, the day before Easter, in the local secular newspaper, The State Journal-Register. Easter should be a time for all Christians to rejoice in their shared belief in the Lord’s resurrection, yet the Episcopalian priest-columnist Tom Ehrich took the occasion to write divisively, “In the Roman Catholic Church, where central control is everything, a wave of decentralized thinking is threatening Rome’s control over congregations, personal practices and even doctrine.” His point was that the Catholic Church threatens his view of what he calls “free thinking.” He claims that the method of the Messiah was to encourage “freedom from all constraints.”

In my March 11 column in the Catholic Times, I briefly made mention of the fact that, “The Catholic Church teaches that artificial contraception is wrong, but planning the size of one’s family can be done [in a morally acceptable manner] with natural family planning (NFP).”

Earlier this month, I traveled to Rome with the bishops of our region (Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin) for meetings with the Pope Benedict XVI and other Vatican officials. These are periodic meetings that bishops are expected to make every few years to report to the Holy See on the various ministries of our dioceses. This is called an ad limina visit because one of its primary features is a visit to the tombs of the Apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul.

Last November, President Barack Obama assured Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, that he would rein in his administration’s attempts to require virtually all private health plans to include coverage for all FDA-approved prescription contraceptives, abortion pills and female sterilization procedures. These requirements were included in an “interim final rule” issued on Aug. 1, 2011 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). These were listed among “preventive services for women” that all health plans would have to include without co-pays or other cost-sharing — even if the insurer, the employer or other plan sponsor, or the woman herself object to such coverage. There have been many protests, including formal comments filed with HHS by many organizations and a petition signed by over 430 Catholic leaders. The president sought to assure Archbishop Dolan and all the bishops of the United States that our concerns were unfounded.

Recently I participated in a meeting between Illinois Gov. Patrick Quinn and several other Catholic Bishops of Illinois. Some reports of this meeting have been inaccurate or incomplete. Since I was present for this meeting, I would like to set the record straight.