The Fight Over Contraception

By Michelle Armstead

Opposition to Obama’s mandate requiring faith-based employers to provide contraceptive health coverage is about religion, not anti-women sentiments, some local Catholics said. 

Father Mark Inglot, pastor of St. John Catholic Church and Student Center in East Lansing, stated that the use of artificial contraception is against the teachings of the Church that advocates natural family planning as a method of birth control.

Artificial contraception gives you permission not to accept responsibility for your actions and face the consequences, Inglot added. “Even contraceptives aren’t 100 percent foolproof.”

Opposing Catholics are a minority among those who are for the requirement of employers to provide contraceptive health care to their employees at no cost, shown by the Public Religion Research Institute’s survey in February 2012.

However, Katie Diller, director of Student Outreach at St. John Catholic Church and Student Center, gave a more medical reason for her opposition to artificial birth control.

While working as a biological researcher at Yale Medical School performing HIV tests on monkeys, Diller learned the “normal thing to do” when testing new vaccines on HIV, give the female monkeys a shot of Depo-Provera, the birth control shot.

Diller was informed that the shot increased the likelihood of infection due to the increased hormone level that deteriorates natural barriers.

Young women on birth control are more susceptible to STDs.  If they have multiple partners, they are at a greater risk. This isn’t an issue for married women, Diller concluded.

Jordan Zammit, a Roman Catholic student at MSU stated that birth control takes away pregnancy, a danger of having “rampant sex” with people that will cause people to have sex more often, devaluing the act.

However, many women’s groups, such as EMILY’s List, have viewed the opposition of the contraceptive bill as a step backward in women’s rights asking the question of whether the presidential election was being held in 2012 or 1956, reported the Huffington Post.

Taking women’s rights away are not a factor, stated Zammit.

“If we’re mandated to provide certain things that are against the tenants of our faith, what’s going to prevent the government from mandating other things we’re against?” asked Inglot.