The Health Care Bill

I make it a point not to discuss politics in my Country Parson blog. However, the health care bill being rammed through Congress is not a political issue: it is a moral one.

The obvious issue is abortion. What I have read about the bill (though I have not read the bill itself) is consistent with the bill's strongest proponents, President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid. That consistency is that the unborn are not protected human life. Unborn children are only valuable as experimental medical commodities. These three see no harm in aborting children and they are hard pressed to find a reason to protect them in a federally-funded health care bill.

This is an unfortunate fact of life for we who support life, especially for the unborn. From the top, the three most powerful positions in the U.S. government are admitted, confessed, and practicing pro-abortionists. We can only pray for them, for their repentance, and keep our voices heard. (And we can thank God for pro-life representatives and the stand they take against the Abortionist-in-Chief and his lackeys.)

There are other issues, too. Health care coverage for unmarried adult couples, especially homosexual couples, is in the bill. I'm not opposed to homosexuals having health care coverage. I am opposed to homosexual marriage and to homosexual couples having benefits of marriage.

And, for that matter, non-married heterosexual couples shouldn't have the benefits of marriage, either. Maybe since "shacking up" has become the norm in our culture this seems harsh. But the Truth is that marriage is marriage, and without vows made between a man and woman before God, there is no marriage.

A more grievous threat is the creeping shadow of euthanasia. While over-simplified as 'death panels', the fact remains that the health care bill allows the government to choose who gets what benefits. The comparison is made to private companies which do, essentially, the same thing. The key difference is that we have a choice about private companies with which we conduct business. We do not have a choice when the federal government is involved.

Like abortion, euthanasia's only significant benefit is financial. Rather than protecting life in its latter years, the cost of care is placed in the balance on one side with human life on the other. Keeping terminally ill people comfortable and dignified as they die is certainly the moral option. However, making a decision about how much care is given based on the cost is patently immoral. The Obama-Pelosi-Reid bill is only cost conscious.

Another moral issue is the role of government. The government is not a moral institution; it is a social institution. The health care bill makes moral decisions ad nauseum. It is pro-abortion and anti-marriage. It is also condescending to the individual rights of Americans to lead their own lives without government interference. It increases taxes. It limits personal freedom. It is extra-Constitutional (in fact it is supra-Constitutional).

These Trojan horse issues are a direct threat to the Church. Christian doctors and nurses who oppose abortion may be forced to commit the act because it is federally insured. Hospitals run by Christian denominations would be in the same boat. They could be compelled to allow patients to die because of financial concerns rather than providing decent end-of-life care.

Just as important is the potential for government censorship of the pulpits of those who disagree with the government. If free, taxpayer funded abortion is the law of the land, what becomes of the voice of dissent? If benefits for non-married couples are acceptable to the government, what about those of us who support marriage?

It is imperative to pray for President Obama, Congressman Pelosi and Senator Reid. It is important to pray for our nation that we may find true moral high ground and an ethical, upright way to provide health care for those most needful of it.