Convictions

With the rise of Rick Santorum as the new champion of religious medievalism, there are renewed cries of persecution from religious extremists in the Roman Catholic Church and other institutions of dogmatic control of human minds. The Health Care Reform Act is one of the targets of these extremists. They maintain that requiring all Federally funded health providers to provide health services such as sexual education, fertility counseling and abortion violates their religious convictions. They also feel that having to treat homosexual patients for STDs with proper respect and counseling is against their religious convictions. I would speculate that being required to treat gay men with HIV with respect and proper health education would also violate their convictions.

The word "conviction" coming from the Roman Catholic Church reminds me of all the convictions of Roman Catholic priests for child abuse that should have happened but did not because of government collusion with that institution. It also reminds me of all the convictions of evangelical extremists for child abuse against their LGBT children for generations which did not happen because of the collusion of government with evangelical churches and parents. 

Conviction is another word for a rigidly held belief system. If the convictions of religious people were rigidly held beliefs in respect, love and understanding of truly human needs and differences, they would have no problem with the Health Care Reform Act or with LGBT organizations. If the convictions of religious people were rigidly held beliefs in the U.S. Constitution's wisdom in separating Church and State, they would have no problem with the U.S. government tending to the medical needs of the entire population, regardless of religion.

The sad fact is that the religious organizations of the United States have benefited for three decades by a corrosion of Constitutional values by politics and money. Ronald Reagan exploited religion to come to power as the figurehead of a corporate agenda to limit true personal freedoms in the name of financial expansion of the wealthy. Religious organizations have done their damage in those three decades. They have seriously stripped money from public education. They have held back the forty-year struggle for LGBT equality. They have negatively affected medical treatment and research in the U.S.. And they are still trying to hold on to their power in government. 

Cries of government persecution by organized religions in the U.S. are frankly absurd. They are lies. Organized religions are privileged organizations in the U.S. beyond any Constitutional right. They are exempt from taxes. They have managed to cushion themselves from equal law enforcement. They have seriously damaged public science education. I hope to see the U.S. government pursue convictions of those in religion who use their 'faith' to cover up corruption, exploitation and abuse.