Photo ~ NARAL's Nancy Keenan and President Obama

‘ACT NOW’: abortion lobby jumps to defend birth control mandate as groundswell of opposition rises

WASHINGTON, January 31, 2012 - As a formidable tide of Christian opposition began rising this week, including at least 115 U.S. bishops, the nation’s leading abortion lobby is leaping to defend the Obama administration order that will force religious institutions to provide free birth control next year.

In an email Tuesday, NARAL Pro-Choice America president Nancy Keenan rallied supporters to combat the surge of opposition by “birth-control opponents” to what many have called an unprecedented challenge to the freedom of Christians who oppose abortion and birth control.

“Anti-choice lawmakers are so hostile to birth control that one representative called the new coverage policy ‘unrelated to the basic needs of health care.’ How is birth control not basic health care when 99 percent of women use it at some point in the lives?” wrote Keenan.

Keenan was criticizing a bill to block the mandate introduced by Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE), who decried the order as “a bailout for Planned Parenthood.”

The mandate, which includes abortifacient birth control such as Ella, only grants a narrow exception to religious insurers serving primarily members of their own sects, prompting U.S. bishops to decry the new regulations in the strongest terms.

After Christians complained about the rule after it was announced last summer, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius this month said that the rule would not change, but the HHS would give religious groups another year to comply.

LifeSiteNews.com