Furious Maryland Feminists Target Catholic Hospital
Two Maryland hospitals, Holy Cross and AdventistHealthCare, have submitted bids to run a new facility in northern Montgomery County; the former is Catholic and the latter is owned by the Seventh Day Adventist Church. Holy Cross is being opposed by feminists because it is anti-abortion.
Catholic League president Bill Donohue jumped on this issue today:
Feminists from Planned Parenthood, NARAL and the National Organization for Women (NOW), are saying that if Holy Cross gets the bid, it would hurt “indigent citizens.” Why would this happen? Because their care is “reimbursed by state funds.” This argument, however, collapses when considering the evidence: Holy Cross has a mission statement that commits it to doing charitable work for the indigent. This is not idle talk. For example, right now, more than 70 percent of uninsured women having children come from around the state to Holy Cross’ current location in Silver Spring.
What’s really bugging the feminists is the refusal of Catholic hospitals to perform abortions. That’s why a member of NOW exploded at Holy Cross, telling them to “get out of the way.” The champions of abortion would rather see uninsured women suffer before ever saying okay to a Catholic hospital.
Think of it this way. Why is one group of women, almost all of whom are wealthy, white and post-menopausal, so enthusiastic about the rights of another group of women, almost all of whom are poor, non-white and fertile? It wouldn’t make sense unless it was the goal of the privileged to limit the numbers of the dispossessed. This, of course, is exactly what motivated Margaret Sanger to found Planned Parenthood—to weed out what she called “the undesirables.”
Coupled with their virulent anti-Catholicism, these affluent feminists should be discussed in every college class on racism, classism and bigotry.
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This religious/control issue is always disturbing. The silliness of declaring that a fertilized human ova is a 'citizen' deserving of all protections of a citizen is absurd. There are thousands of teeny tiny frozen citizens. Ths is a secular govt and not a theocracy and the issue should be kept at the pulpit. It occurs to me that when (mostly male) Anti-Choice clerics can't get THEIR women to do what they want them to do from the Pulpit, they take it to the Legislators to Force their women and other women to obey. Catholic Hospitals should be denied ANY and ALL public monies if they are not going to provide constitutional care to women !
It's ALL a Control of Women issue and has little if anything to do with loving babies . TIS.
Maybe someone can explain to me where in our Constitution is says that public funds should be used to support the agendas of various religious orders. A taxpayer funded, public hospital should NOT be handed over to wild eyed religious fanatics. If Catholics (or any other cult) want to open hospitals, let them do it on their own dime, not mine.
I doubt very much that Catholics would be happy about being forced to be treated at a Muslim hospital, so why exactly do they figure it's okay to impose their beliefs on others?
Freedom "of" religion necessarily includes freedom "from" religion. Tyranny in any form is an abomination.
Erect hospitals all the time, though.
In fact, the LDS Church opened one just down the street from my home. I have not noticed any imposition of religious doctrine on my visits. My g/f works there and she does not have to follow the church 's rules.
The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'.
Why don't the feminists make their own hospital instead of kvetching about how other people run things in their own hospitals?
The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'.
So, the story here is that two groups want to run a county-funded hospital. One of the groups will limit access to safe and legal medical procedures for low- income women and the other may or may not.
Instead of writing that story, the author(s) have chosen to attack feminists, women who have decided that it is important for all people, regardless of income, to have access to the same medical care and rights. Based upon the unfounded assertion (facts, please) that feminists are wealthy, white, and post-menopausal, they declare that feminists are closet eugenicists. This is an incredibly inept strawman.
So tell me, being neither wealthy nor post-menopausal, if I were raped, would I be wrong to prefer being taken to a hospital that would offer me the services I require rather than pamphlets and platitudes?
(And FYI-using the term "non-white" is pretty damned racist . What's next, calling women "non-male"? In the future, consider finding ways to describe people that do not define them based entirely upon their exclusion from the white male power structure.)
I'm going to see if the local Beth Elohim hospital wants to mandate the circumcision of all boys born at the hospital. Because, you know, that's our thing. That makes exactly as much sense as refusing abortions.
I would be laughed out of the room.
Why when the issue of hospitals not doing abortions comes up is it always about Catholic hospitals? Our local non-profit hospital isn't Catholic but it decided not to do abortions.
I can't wait to read your responses to Jill "The Shrill" Stanek. She's one of the contributors on this site and posts an anti- abortion /anti-"independent, intelligent, free thinking, secular" woman rant about once a week. It's really quite entertaining.
I like you Hap. Your post put a smile on my face. Thank you.
Holy Cross Hospital is a great organization serving a hardened community, but this issue has to do with who pays the bill. HCH performs all kinds of services and often time doesn’t see a dime! So if the Catholic Church is footing the bill I say let them set the rules.