Helen Alvare, a former spokeswoman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat for Pro-life Activities, is an associate professor of law at George Mason University and serves as chair of the Conscience Protection Task Force at the Witherspoon Institute.
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HHS Doesn’t Speak For Me, or Many Women
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Pundits and politicians who opine about the so-called war on women ought to take note of the lawsuits filed Monday against the Department of Health and Human Services contraception mandate by 43 religious groups, including several Catholic dioceses and colleges.
The suits object to the requirement that religious institutions provide their employees with insurance coverage for contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs.
In the propaganda surrounding the mandate, HHS seems to suggest that women’s only stake in the matter is “free” contraception. This is a shallow – and frankly demeaning – view of women, who, equally with men, have an important stake in the preservation of religious freedom in the United States.