Less than a week after the Supreme Court heard oral arguments about the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive requirement, the court released an order requesting that additional briefs be submitted showing if and how contraceptive insurance coverage could be obtained by employees through their insurance companies without directly involving the religious employers objecting to this coverage.
Visuals often are much easier to grasp than a complicated thicket of issues. That may be why the Little Sisters of the Poor have become the public face of Zubik v. Burwell, which goes before the U.S. Supreme Court March 23.
The head of the Eternal Word Television Network said Feb. 18 that a federal appeals court ruling handed down earlier that day “in effect” orders the Catholic global network “to violate its religious beliefs and comply” with the federal contraceptive mandate or “pay massive fines to the IRS.”
Sister Constance Veit, l.s.p., communications director for the Little Sisters of the Poor in the U.S., explains why the sisters could not “just sign the form” – the so-called “accommodation” to the HHS contraception mandate.
The U.S. Supreme Court justices said Nov. 6 they will hear seven pending appeals in lawsuits brought by several Catholic and other faith-based entities against the Obama administration’s contraceptive mandate.
Two federal appeals courts acted Aug. 21 in cases related to the contraceptive mandate for employee health insurance. One court said the Little Sisters of the Poor need not comply with its July ruling against them while the sisters appeal to the Supreme Court.
Early in our community’s history, a group of townspeople who witnessed the Sisters’ humble charity toward the elderly dubbed them the “Little” Sisters of the Poor. The name stuck. Recently, however, we have become known to some as “the HHS Sisters” due to our lawsuit against the federal government over the contraceptive mandate.
A seventh federal appeals court ruled Aug. 7 that there is no religious rights conflict with a process created for nonprofit religious organizations to get around a government mandate to provide coverage for contraceptives in employee health insurance.
In a July 23 filing with the U.S. Supreme Court, the Little Sisters of the Poor have asked the court for relief from being forced to comply with the federal contraceptive mandate or face heavy fines.
A U.S. District Court in Denver issued a permanent injunction in favor of a Colorado-based heating and cooling company owned by a Catholic family.
