CA Requiring Church's to Pay for Abortions

California is now requiring church's to pay for abortions through the church's healthcare plans. In 2014, Skyline Wesleyan Church in La Mesa, CA was one of the religious institutions that fell victim to Planned Parenthood's letter to the Department of Managed Health Care that led to them rescinding existing religious accommodations in insurance plans. Pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church, Lisa Amann, says that directly or indirectly funding abortions would be a violation of her fundamental, Biblically-based beliefs. Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is bringing this case up the court system to fight for Skyline's right to free speech and free exercise. The dangerous issue at stake is the government's ability to not only censor what privately-funded organizations can say, but mainly what they are forced to publicly endorse with risk of possible punishment if they choose not to. Defenders of the law claim that healthcare providers are treating all health plans neutrally, but it is directly in conflict with certain religious beliefs and provides no religious exemption. This case brings up a case the Supreme Court ruled on just over a year ago and should rely on that precedent.

The California Reproductive Freedom, Accountability, Comprehensive Care, and Transparency Act, known as the “Act” or “FACT Act,” was a revision and extension for the previous Reproductive Privacy Act. The purpose of the Act was to ensure that all women were informed of all health services available to them. However, the Act requires any license-covered facility to “disseminate a notice to all clients, as specified, stating, among other things, that California has public programs that provide immediate free or low-cost access to comprehensive family planning services, prenatal care, and abortion, for eligible women.” It would also require that unlicensed facilities disclose that they are not licensed as a medical facility by California. The only difference between "licensed" and "unlicensed" facilities, as the Act defines them, is that a "licensed" facility provides abortions and contraception or contraceptive methods and an "unlicensed" facility does not. The Act also defines exactly how facilities are supposed to advertise their services, including what verbiage is to be used, where in the facility it must be advertised (which is "conspicuously" in the "entrance"), and even what font size is required.

Because of the Act, a pro-Life pregnancy center in 2017 was being forced to advertise abortions, which was contrary to their beliefs. Their goal is to provide all options to women, including abortions, but not making abortion their first and only option. They claimed that having a sign about abortion sitting in their waiting room or outside their doors would take away from what they are trying to do. If women walk into the clinic with this messaging on their minds, the clinic says it could take away from the honest conversations they get to have with women about all their choices. The President, CEO, and General Counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, Michael P. Farris, said “No one should be forced by the government to express a message that violates their convictions, especially on deeply divisive subjects such as abortion. In this case, the government used its power to force pro-life pregnancy centers to provide free advertising for abortion. The Supreme Court said that the government can’t do that, and that it must respect pro-life beliefs... If we want to have freedom for ourselves, we have to extend it to others.” Farris also said in 2018 that the Act only served as a way to force pro-lifers to become advocates for abortion, a violation of their free speech and free exercise. It is a slippery slope to require pro-life centers to advertise messages that are contrary to their fundamental values because it opens the door for more government control over private institutions. Skyline Wesleyan is now fighting that same slippery slope. For them to indirectly pay for abortions would be asking them to violate their understanding that abortion is murder and to aid in it being performed.

This issue was brought to the Supreme Court in National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA) v Becerra (2018). The question presented in the case was whether or not the requirements of the Act violated the free speech of these institutions. The Court ruled in favor of NIFLA in a 5-4 decision, saying that the Act violated the First Amendment because "professional speech" is not excluded from free speech protections and the licensed notice part of the Act was content-based, a First Amendment violation. Justice Thomas' also called the licensed notice "wildly under-inclusive" when it came actually providing information to women about state-sponsored health services, which was the Act's stated purpose. It essentially only clarified if a facility performed abortions or not, a controversial attack on pro-lifers. The dissenting opinion pushed back, saying that the notice requirements would survive a constitutional scrutiny test and said that failure to produce this information could create an undue burden for women seeking specific services.

I think the Court ruled correctly in NIFLA v Becerra and that they should hold on to that ruling in light of the recent case with Skyline Wesleyan that is working its way up the court system. It is important for healthcare providers to be transparent with what they can and cannot do for their clients. This should also include employer healthcare plans, employers should be upfront about what services they are willing to provide as part of their healthcare plans. Employees do not need to use the healthcare provided by their employer, but they should be fully informed of what that plan includes. If employees do not wish to use the employer's health plan because of religious or secular purposes, they are allowed to do just that since there is no Constitutional guarantee that being religious or nonreligious should be free, as we have spoken about with Sherbert v Verner (1963). Insurance companies should allow religious exemptions in healthcare plans because the plans are optional for employees. Doing this would in no way coerce an employee to act in a certain way, but by not providing religious exemptions to employers choosing employee healthcare plans, especially if part of that plan violates their fundamental religious beliefs, California state laws are forcing church's to act in a secular way and against their moral convictions.