. . . the religious left is rallying behind the health care package being debated in Congress and decrying the tactics used by the plan’s rightwing opponents.
UPDATE: ELCA Lutherans' own health insurance plan for clergy and church employees covers abortion -- even for sex-selection.
UPDATE 8/19/09: Obama orchestrates his faithful following
-- From "‘Religious Left’ tackles health care reform" by Andy Birkey, Minnesota Independent 8/18/09
A new coalition is promising “40 Days of Health Reform” — and it’ll hit Minneapolis in the next few weeks.
The campaign was launched to show the spiritual need for health reform, not to support any one specific set of policies. And it’s seen some immediate success as President Obama will join coalition members on a conference call later this week.
“This isn’t a political issue, it is a deeply theological issue, a biblical issue, and a moral issue,” said Jim Wallis, president of Sojourners magazine in a conference call last week. “So we are not going to at any time during the debate weigh in on the particulars of policy questions…[We’ll] leave the plumbing to the politicians.”
Wallis didn’t mince words in a recent editorial in his publication. “The ’storm troopers’ of political demagoguery, such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Glenn Beck, have mobilized their followers to disrupt town meetings and defeat comprehensive reform by yelling louder than anybody else,” he wrote. “The campaign tactics include lies, intimidation, character assassination, verbal abuse, and even mob behavior against members of Congress trying to conduct town hall meetings on the issues.”
[The 40 Days coalition includes the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, as well as] some of America’s largest [liberal 'Christian'] denominations: The Episcopal Church, the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc., United Methodist Church, the Unitarian Universalist Association, African Methodist Episcopal Church, the National Council of Churches in Christ, the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the United Church of Christ.
Some [liberal] Catholic groups are also on board: NETWORK, a National Catholic Social Justice Lobby, Catholics United, and Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good.
For Catholics and many other people of faith, the issue of abortion is an important one, but the coalition is refusing to let it be a stumbling block.
To read the entire article, CLICK HERE.
