You’re clearly not knowledgeable in Church law or workings. If 60% of high school graduates couldn’t locate China or Russia on a map, does that mean they didn’t graduate high school? Of course not. The people don’t vote what the Church teaches or believes in. Its incumbant on them to learn the philosophy and whether or not to accept it. In our secular society, of course many don’t take on that initiative. That doesn’t make them wrong- but just ignorant of WHY the Church teaches it.

You’re clearly not knowledgeable in Church law or workings. If you were to say that 90% of Catholic’s do not believe in Jesus Christ, does that make the Church not teach that Jesus is the Son of God? Of course not. The people don’t vote what the Church teaches or believes in. Its incumbant on them to learn the philosophy and whether or not to accept it. In our secular society, of course many don’t take on that initiative. That doesn’t make them wrong- but just ignorant of WHY the Church teaches it.

Proscribing Plan B – or the Cervical Cancer vaccine- cannot be made simply because “we think its in your best interest”. That’s not legally sound. It doesn’t make sense. I’m an EMT and in my field I am often faced with the question of what is in a patient’s “best interest” – and sometimes forcing them against their will to be committed to a hospital. I have also been faced many times with family members and law enforcement who are at thier wits end or don’t know what else to do with a patient who won’t be seen by a doctor and tell me that they have to go. But people are autonomous beings and if they don’t fall under strict legal criteria to be committed, they simply can’t be. Difficult as is it is, people will have various beliefs, reasons, and experiences that will prevent them from conforming to the common societal standards. And sometimes those beliefs might prove to be correct and the standard in future times.

The bottom line in this debate is that the Catholic Church is THE most prominent religious institution in this state and holds a reasonable basis for its belief. Its position is very clearly protected under the 1st Amendment and no judge would allow this law to touch those institutions. Similarly, non-religious hospitals may have similar policies for other medical or philosophical reasons for not offering Plan B. Those also are private instutitions with reasonable philosophies. The alternative is to send someone to another hospital and the time required to do so in such a small state where you can drive to any one of 36 hospitals OR any of hundreds of private medical providers within an hour and a half does not represent an undue burden by any imagination.

Come on Toucan. Neither I nor Dr. Davidoff ever said that Plan B was an “ineffective medical prescription when given to rape victims.” In fact, the administrators in Catholic hospital don’t believe that either — which is why they DO dispense Plan B EXCEPT UNDER ONE NARROW CIRCUMSTANCE: WHEN THE VICTIM MAY BE PREGNANT, at which point, says Dr. Davidoff, the drug cannot induce an abortion. The drug is “ineffective,” in other words, only under the conditions in which Catholic hosptials refeuse to administer Plan B. This means that you and others wish to use the powers of the state to force religious people to commit crimes against cannon law so that they may distribute to rape victims a drug that cannot abort an unwanted child. That is the clear meaning and import of Dr. Davidoff’s testimony. I ask you again — do these measures make sense?

You can frame the issue anyway you like; it’s a free country, though there are some who would like to make it less so. The proposed legislation, however, does not seek to check unreasonable ideologies. The practical effect of the legislation will be to force Catholic hospitals — not to mention the Catholics who work in them — to violate their consciences and to commit a crime against the cannon law of their church. That is not an ideological description; it is a precise description of what the bill will do. That is an extreme – not to mention unconstitutional – measure. A reasonable person, faced with such a Draconian solution to a problem that may not exist – the jury is yet out on that one – must ask himself: what is the problem precisely, and can it be settled by other means. I do not find anyone here asking or attempting to answer that question. If Dr, Davidoff’s assertions are accurate, we are on the point of forcing Catholics in this state to violate their consciences because they are unwilling to provide an “ineffective” medical prescription to rape victims. See the above entrée. Now, this sort of thing may disturb only a small number of Catholics in the state. But this is a matter that should not be settled by counting heads. It should be settled by using brainpower.

When 90% of even Catholics think a raped woman should be quickly given whatever she needs to avoid a pregnancy, yes, the proper place for a woman to receive Plan B is in the emergency room. Period.

Catholic or non-Catholic hospital is not the issue. Having medical professionals promptly assist a rape victim is.

I bet even Bishop Mansell won’t go on record saying that a woman, after being violently raped, should sit back, do nothing, and if impregnated go ahead and give birth to the rapist’s baby. Honestly, I’d like to hear him say it.

This debate is all about ideology run amok. And yes, the government should simply legislate it out of the health-care profession.

Catholic hospitals refuse to administed Plan B if there is reason to believe that ovulation has occurred, otherwise the drug is administered to rape victims. Dr. Davidoff says that the drug is “completely ineffective” when used after ovulation. We are now on the piont of issuing a bill that would force Catholic Hospitals to violate their religious precepts by administering a pill that Dr Davidoiff says would be completly ineffective under the circumstances in which Catholic hospitals would refuse to administed the… what to call it? …placebo. Does this make sense?

Emergency contraception is offensive to whom? Honestly, I know many Catholics, and while some of them are against abortion, none of them are against contraception. If the Catholic church isn’t against contraception, why are they making this big stink against what you suggest should be a commonsense consensus?

I do hear you about a slippery slope. But exceptions in the case of rape or incest is pretty much a given across the country, even with regard to a majority of pro-life activists. This isn’t a road to anywhere. It’s just basic human decency needing to be enforced by the government.

What do you believe? Do you agree with the Bishop that if a woman is violently raped, she should take no steps to prevent a pregnancy? And then heaven forbid, if she does become pregnant, she should valiantly bear the child of her assailant?

You see, in practice no one believes that a woman shouldn’t have a choice under those circumstances. The rest is sheer ideology, which a few are trying to impose on the individual, in this case a health care consumer following a rape.