Today some Roman Catholics bishops and others will be holding Stand Up for Religious Freedom rallies to oppose President Obama's efforts to expand health care coverage, including contraception, to women.
Portland, Ore. rally organizer Jason Schmidt, echoing Rush Limbaugh, called women who support contraception "sluts" on his Twitter account yesterday. Are these the type of people the U.S. Conference of Roman Catholic Bishops now associate with? We should be able to disagree without calling women names or accusing the President falsely of attacking religious liberty.
In fact, religious leaders - including Roman Catholics, Mainline Christians and Evangelical Christians - have offered support for President Obama's efforts.
As a minister in the United Church of Christ, I strongly support the efforts of the White House to protect women from unwanted pregancies, cancer and STDs that contraception can help prevent. And I condemn religious leaders who associate with those who refer to women as "sluts" because of a disagreement over public policy.
