Check your conscience at the door...
Print ViewWhat do you do when you've hired an employee who won't do what you tell him to do? What do you do with a business that won't do what a customer wants? How about a pharmacist that fails to fill a prescription because his conscience won't let him? (An Eckerd drugstore fired just such a pharmacist a few years back.)
"The Bush administration recently attempted to redefine abortion while protecting pro-life advocates. [A recent] proposal states that 'all recipients of aid
under federal health programs are expected to certify that they will
not refuse to hire nurses and other providers who object to abortion
and even certain types of birth control.' " Read the full article.
After you read the article, listen to Chuck Colson's "Breakpoint" commentary "Tolerating Bigotry: Why We Need a Conscience Clause," which aired Tuesday.
(You can read his commentary here.)
DEADLINE for your comments is MIDNIGHT WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17. by now, you know the rules -- grades are based on thoughfulness of your response, referring to specific points in the article, Colson's commentary, and/or your classmate's comments. You may post more than once so that you can respond to a classmate.
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you know they never give the same rights to pro-life as pro-abortion. you have more funding, advertising, support everything for pro abortion. people these days always complain about their rights, blah blah blah, but they never want to give rights to christians, or in this case pro-life ppl. how come there isn't any funding for pro-life hospitals or clinics? if someone fired a pro-abortion person for their beliefs you can gauruntee that there would be this huge deal, make the news, protests and what not. why arn't christians and other pro-life ppl fighting harder for their rights? you hear twice as much junk about abortions as you do for pro-life. why not put more advertising for options about other decisions you can make w/ an unwanted child? all these equal rights gurus are liars, sure they will fight for equal rights for their beleifs but they don't care about anyone's contradicting views. we need to fight for our right to be pro-life before their gone for good. things don't change just by wishing and talking, things change because ppl get up and do something about it. pro-life should have the same rights as pro-abortionists, but is there anyone willing to stand up for it? half our problem is we just sit back and get angry while we let the pro-abortionists take over. they make exceptions for everyone else in america, why can't they make them for us? life should not be defined as expendable.
Posted by Gracie — Dec 16, 2008 11:22
In my opinion.. (only being 16 years old) reading all the articles, I feel like you could get sooo many different opinions on this subject according to your own beliefs! In the first article that we had to read, I personally think that if a person is a Christian or has a belief that abortion is wrong & that they don't want to perform the abortion, that person should not even be interested in that specific field of work that requires these things to be done. It says in the article, "Congress, according to the administration has passed several laws to make certain that doctors, hospitals, and health plans would not be forced to perform abortions." I think personally as a Christian I wouldn't even want to work in an environment that does abortions, even if I didn't have to perform them myself I feel that if they work with it, they are supporting it. I think that the Eckerd pharmacist was completely WRONG not giving out the prescription bc "his conscience wouldn't let him," if an individual wants that certain type of prescription, whether it's a certain type of birth control or not, legally they can purchase it! If the pharmacist's conscience tells him that it is wrong or tells him to not give that individual the prescription, he should not be in the field of filling ALL perscriptions (good and bad) and should probably find a different field of work to be in. Don't get me wrong, I do NOT think that birth control should be handed out to anyone! As a Christian, my perspective on this subject is that if you are MARRIED, i feel there are CERTAIN types of birth control that is fine to use for CERTAIN situations. I also think that there are other types of birth control that are completely irresponsible & DUMB to use, for example "post-life birth control." The article also says, "that women are being put at risk now because they could have less access to birth control and the information they need to make health care decisions." I think that if a female that is not married, has complete & total access to birth control, it gives them more room to "play" and to go out and do whatever it is they want to do. In my perspective, I think that any un-married female should have absolutly NO access to birth control! ..Unless it is for a "specific" health reason..
Posted by Brittney — Dec 16, 2008 20:27
My opinion is that; As Christians, we definitly do have to take a stand against things that we strongly disagree on. But in doing so,we need to be sure first, before taking any action, that what we are about to do is level headed. We have think before we act immediatly on what we believe. On the other hand, If you're a pro-life doctor and you are forced to perform an abortion, and it came down to your job being at stake, if it was me then I would quit! It's a good idea to try to get your message out into the world about doing wholesome and sensible things, but its VERY WRONG!, to IMPRESS someone with your beliefs. I really wish that our country could realize the mistakes they are making. To realize that a life is still a life even if it hasn't been born yet! Or that God mad men and women to marry and be attracted to the opposite sex...........maybe someday.
Posted by Daniel — Dec 17, 2008 17:07
In my opinion, there are quite a bit of pro-life in todays society that would recant their moral beleifs and perform an abortion when they were told to do it. I think the reason is because they are afraid that they would lose their job. If I were a pro-life doctor told to perform an abortion, I would either quit my job, or refuse to do it and dare them to fire me because I won't recant my moral beliefs to keep a job. If youwere in that position would you fear your boss, or God. We as pro-life Christians need to take a stand for what we know is right and stand against abortion.
Posted by Brian — Dec 17, 2008 21:32
I think that it is good that Bush is calling for this document that hospitals would have to sign stating that when they are looking to hire someone the fact that they were pro-life would not be the reason that they didn't get the job, because he shows that he is pro-life, but I don't understand why he is doing now that he only has about one month left in office. I think he probably should of started making these steps when he first took office back in January 01', so that he could of had a larger impact agianst abortionist ideas. Also by signing a piece of paper saying that your aren't going to discriminate pro-life doctors and nurses is not going to stop them for not hiring them. All they have to do is just throw the application away or just ignore it. Another thing is that it is ridiculous that a doctor would be or could be fired for not giving someone a perscription i mean if it was a matter of life or death (ironic that in this case it would be perscribing death) they don't have to give any particular person a specific perscription. If your doctor won't give you a perscription simpily just get a different doctor. if I was a doctor I would let everyone know that I was Pro-Life before they became one of my patients...
Posted by Aaron — Dec 17, 2008 21:54
I totally agree with what Bush is trying to do and thing it is the right thing to be done. You know its kind of scary to think that the government is trying to tell us how we should believe or at least not let us express how we feel. I mean come on isn't it a free country or what. What ever happened to those freedoms that are promised in the constitution. Telling a doctor that he can't refuse to give someone a certain pill and refer them to another clinic in a sense is taking away the freedom of speech. Now Thats Scary!!!!!!!
Posted by Tim — Dec 17, 2008 21:58
In my opinion, this is a dumb issue to be discussing. It's just creating more groups within the abortion vs pro-life issue. I personally believe that if the government is going to act like a business, it has full liberty to place any kind of specifications on it clients, who can simply not take part in the deal if they so choose. If they made it a law that you had to cut a finger off for each ten thousand dollars borrowed, then you'd only be bound to those terms if you made a federal loan. Competition would rise and Congress would reconsider the deal. These regulations proposed in reality by Bush would only apply to federally funded groups. So really what we need to do is cut back on our taxes, and use it at our own discretion. The only problem with that is those with money can do a lot more than those with less...but they did earn it. If the people honestly care about more about equal rights, the problems shouldn't exist. Too bad life is really more complicated than we realize, so we can't win it all. Socialists are just looking for a utopia too, you know.
Posted by Seth, the Jeenior — Dec 17, 2008 23:46
I just can get over the whole fact that people are idiots. We should not even have to give people pills pertaining to birth control. There are obvious guidlines that people should follow even if they dont believe in the bible. For example, when you do something that you know has bad consequences, instead of finding ways to make thoughs consequences go away, you should just not do it. For example stealing, robbing a bank, cheating, etc. I just think its outrageous that it has come to this point. When really should be wrong in the countries eyes, just like stealing, and robbing a bank are.
Posted by Greg — Dec 18, 2008 21:58