{"id":77390,"date":"2015-10-17T13:46:35","date_gmt":"2015-10-17T17:46:35","guid":{"rendered":"\/news\/?p=77390"},"modified":"2015-10-19T20:58:25","modified_gmt":"2015-10-20T00:58:25","slug":"california-churches-sue-state-agency-for-forcing-them-to-cover-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/california-churches-sue-state-agency-for-forcing-them-to-cover-abortion\/","title":{"rendered":"California churches sue state agency for forcing them to cover abortion"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><p>Three California churches are suing a state agency that requires churches across the state\u00a0to cover elective abortions in heath insurance plans. The pro-life and religious liberty law nonprofit, Alliance Defending Freedom, is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.adfmedia.org\/News\/PRDetail\/9780\">suing<\/a> California&#8217;s Department of Managed Health Care on behalf of Calvary Chapel Chino Hills in Chino, Foothill Church in Glendora, and The Shepard of the Hills Church in Porter Ranch.<\/p>\n<p>In 2014, in response to an ADF complaint, the agency affirmed its intentions to mandate that all plans cover elective abortions, despite the First Amendment&#8217;s religious liberty protections and federal conscience laws.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->\u201cThe government has no right to demand that church health insurance plans contain coverage for abortion \u2013 something that violates these churches\u2019 most sincerely held religious beliefs,&#8221; ADF senior legal counsel, Erik Stanley, declared. &#8220;California is violating the Constitution by strong-arming churches into having this coverage in their plans.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/petition\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-68636 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.liveactionnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/DefundAd-400b.jpg\" alt=\"DefundAd-400b\" width=\"400\" height=\"170\" srcset=\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/DefundAd-400b.jpg 400w, https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/DefundAd-400b-300x128.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In addition, ADF Litigation Staff Counsel Jeremiah Galus called it &#8220;absurd&#8221; that &#8220;the same government that rightfully does not require California churches to pay for contraceptive coverage requires them to pay for elective abortion coverage.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In an <a href=\"\/news\/pastor-id-go-to-jail-before-funding-abortion\/\">interview with Live Action<\/a>, Calvary Chapel Senior Pastor Jack Hibbs said the mandate is a flagrant disregard for religious liberty and the Constitution.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I have a lot of invested interest in defending the unborn,&#8221; Hibbs said. &#8220;I see the Constitution under attack, and I see my religious freedom under attack.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hibbs contended that he would even &#8221; go to jail,&#8221; if necessary, in order to\u00a0defend the preborn.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We will take this to the point of being jailed, if necessary, being arrested, if necessary \u2013\u00a0 whatever it takes. I cannot violate my biblical worldview,\u201d Hibbs said. \u201cOnce I have to do that, I no longer live in the United States our founding fathers gave me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In June 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court <a href=\"\/news\/breaking-scotus-rules-in-favor-of-hobby-lobby\/\">ruled<\/a> in <em>Hobby Lobby v. Sebelius<\/em> that the government cannot compel closely-held corporations from covering abortion-inducing drugs. Churches are generally recognized as having even stronger claims to religious exemption from such mandates than religious for-profit businesses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Three California churches are suing a state agency that requires churches across the state\u00a0to cover elective abortions in heath insurance plans. The pro-life and religious liberty law nonprofit, Alliance Defending Freedom, is suing California&#8217;s Department of Managed Health Care on behalf of Calvary Chapel Chino Hills in Chino, Foothill Church in Glendora, and The Shepard [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":51767,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[3473],"tags":[19,2978,455,2658,87,5658,1163,5657,3794,278],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>California churches sue state agency for forcing them to cover abortion<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In 2014, CA affirmed its intentions to mandate that all plans cover elective abortions, despite religious liberty protections and federal conscience laws.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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