The following is a cross-post from my second blog (Feeding the Trolls). I feel strongly about this issue, and I hope that, upon reading my remarks, you will, too.

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The United States of America, my home country, is stepping into a new era regarding the availability of health care. Because health care is such an enormous issue, people are bound to have trouble with individual provisions within the larger bills and debates. One of those provisions has to do with Birth Control. I capitalize Birth Control because it is, in my mind, after certain vaccines and quality-of-life-enhancing medications, THE most important health care advancement in history. But even in the U.S., where women are liberated to the point of achieving the majority of advanced degrees offered each year, there is something scary looming large around the availability of contraception: Religion.

Now, I understand that there are countries where women are still considered property, and in those places I wouldn't be at all surprised to see religious leaders refusing to allow contraception to their chattels. But when the Legislative Branch of the United States' government convenes a panel of male religious leaders to weigh in on the availability of Birth Control to American women, I am blown away. And pissed off.

So, I thought I'd write a letter to the eight male witnesses (dominating two panels of ten total witnesses) called by last Thursday:

  • The Most Reverend William E. Lori (Roman Catholic Bishop of Bridgeport, CT)
  • The Reverend Dr. Matthew C. Harrison (President, The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod)
  • C. Ben Mitchell, Ph.D. (Graves Professor of Moral Philosophy, Union University)
  • Rabbi Meir Soloveichik (Director of the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought, Yeshiva University)
  • Craig Mitchell, Ph.D. (Associate Professor of Ethics, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary)
  • John H. Garvey (President, The Catholic University of America)
  • Dr. William K. Thierfelder (President, Belmont Abbey College)
  • Dr. Samuel W. "Dub" Oliver (President, East Texas Baptist University)
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About this Archive

This page is a archive of entries in the Patriotism category from February 2012.

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The Girl Behind The Red Door

Audrey Camp

I'm an American expat and freelance writer living in Oslo, Norway with my husband. I love language, adventure, dogs and classic movies.