Mark Taylor, president of Tyndale House Publishers Inc. in Carol Stream, Ill., explains why Tyndale has joined the list of Christian organizations who have filed lawsuits against the HHS mandate. Why?
As is now widely known, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has ruled that health insurance plans must provide contraceptives free of charge to all plan beneficiaries. As a Protestant, I don’t have a moral objection to contraceptives per se. But HHS defines contraception to include abortifacients such as Plan B (the morning-after pill), Ella (the week-after pill), and intrauterine devices. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius admits that one purpose of these drugs and devices is to keep the fertilized egg from “implantation” onto the wall of the uterus. In other words, their purpose is to cause an early abortion of a human being that is made in the image of God. That’s where I draw the line.
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The HHS mandate became effective for Tyndale House on Oct. 1. If we did not comply, we would be subject to fines of up to $100 per day per employee. We have 260 employees, so the fines could be $26,000 per day. That’s $780,000 per month, and $9.36 million per year—all because our moral and religious compass says that it is wrong for us to provide abortifacient substances or devices under our employee health plan. The federal government is telling us to violate our conscience or pay fines that would put us out of business.
Read the whole thing.
HT: JT