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Tuesday, February 21, 2012

HHS Mandate: A Jewish Response

A quick post to bring a few items to your attention.  More civil suits are being filed against the Obama Administration, again more people are realising that the HHS mandate is not a contraception issue, or even a Catholic issue - it is an issue of religious freedom.

Here is an interesting article by a Jewish writer, David P Goldman, and he's saying that the Jews should challenge this mandate also because Obama can just as easily try to dismantle Jewish religious freedom as much as Catholics's.  They are coming for the Catholics now, the Jews could well be next, he says. 

Goldman mentions a few areas which may fall under scrutiny: kosher slaughter, which has already been banned in some countries; matrilineal descent for deciding who is a Jew - a British court recently decided that it is not up to the Jews to decide who is and who is not a Jew - as if that court had the competence to decide.  And of course, circumcision.  That last one will go if homosexual lobbies have anything to do with it - there is a gay fetish about "intact men", so some gay groups are waging war on circumcision.  If Obama is listening to them, he could well try and outlaw the sign of the Covenant among the Jewish people.   It seems our Jewish brothers and sisters could find themselves back in the days of Antiochus Epiphanes again!

Perhaps Israel's influence might prevent this from happening, given that Israel and the US are allies.  But that is not certain either - there are those in the Democratic party who want to see an end to that relationship and a more decisive shift to the Palestinian cause. 

However, there is an opportunity here for a greater cooperation among Christians and Jews: they can stand together on this issue to help each other.  A prayer to Blessed John Paul II and to St Moses might be a good idea - remember in the Catholic Church we honour the Jewish prophets as Saints: time to invoke them for the Church in these times and for our Jewish brothers and sisters.

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