The Catholic Bishops in the U.S. have, both individually and collectively, sought reform of our health care system for many years. It was part of their support of labor unions, part of their preferential option for the poor, part of the greater ideals to which they have called the sheep of their flocks, and particularly our political leaders.
However, they have always held that health care reform should be true reform: that is, it is currently deformed, and needs to return to its true form. Health care must truly care for the health of all people.
In a letter to Congress [.pdf], the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops set out four main criteria for authentic health care reform.
- A truly universal health policy with respect for human life and dignity
- Access for all with a special concern for the poor and inclusion of legal immigrants
- Pursuing the common good and preserving pluralism including freedom of conscience and variety of options
- Restraining costs and applying them equitably across the spectrum of payers
Note that the Bishops are not supporting or opposing any legislation. Rather, they are giving principles based on human nature, and which can be understood and accepted without any other relation to Christ or Christianity. They simply are voicing the concerns that arise from a Christian worldview.
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4 comboxers:
I like these four points a lot!
Personally, I think that one of the bad points of all the current House and Senate plans is that they don't raise taxes. Obama made a no-tax pledge, and the Republicans are anti-tax too. But it makes no sense. I'm the old kind of conservative: one who would like a smaller government, but who thinks that we need to pay for whatever government we do have.
Because the alternative is a "deficit", which is merely a euphemism for "making our kids pay for it". And the so-called middle class doesn't want to pay more taxes for their own health care, but they have no shame about making their kids and grandkids pay for their health care.
I like these four points much more than I like Bishop Donald Wuerl's recent statement that "We teach that health care is a basic human right, an essential safeguard of human life and dignity."
I'm all for health care, but how can it possibly be a human right? Rights and responsibilities always come in pairs. I have a right not to be murdered, and you have a corresponding obligation not to murder me. But if I have a right to health care for, say, appendicitis, then some doctor somewhere must have a corresponding obligation to remove my appendix. How did he or she incur such an obligation?
And where does it end? Nearly every person over the age of 80 would benefit from having a full-time doctor who sees them weekly, and a live-in nurse who ministers to their needs daily. Such a regime is virtually guaranteed to maximize their life and health. Do they have a right to this? After all, anything less decreases their life expectancy!
Well, this is why there's so much debate about the definition of "basic" health care.
My perspective is that health care is indeed a right, but not an absolute right. It's a sort of supporting right to the right to life. It's also very context dependent. You have a right to be cared for according to the means of your situation, and the society to which you belong has a responsibility to care for you according to its ability. So "basic health care" looks very different for medieval nobility and modern blue-collar workers and extraordinarily attractive people with shady pasts stranded on a mysterious island. But each and all should be given the needed care as much as possible, given the resources available.
I agree. But what is "society"? In America today, that means tax money. And that's not just politics; it's our culture.
When my great-great-grandfather immigrated to Oldenburg, Indiana a century and a half ago, there weren't envelopes for the parish collection. Instead, during the non-harvesting season, the men in town all spent time building a physical church building. Today that sounds absurd. You just give money.
So when you say "the society to which you belong has a responsibility to care for you according to its ability", in practice that means that a certain subset of the population (e.g., those making more than $250,000 per year) have an obligation to pay more taxes. No one else has any obligations. The poor and middle class get free health care and owe nothing. The doctors get more business (paid for by either the insurance companies or the government), but they have no obligations; they aren't working out of duty but merely because they like their paychecks.
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