Obama has been hitting religious talking points to a degree that, had Bush done done it, would have had liberals apoplectic with rage.

Speaking to a coalition of 30 faith-based groups, he thundered that opponents of health care reform were “frankly, bearing false witness.” He then offered a religious justification for his policy preference that somehow failed to make liberal Democrats uncomfortable about church/state entanglement. “These are all fabrications that have been put out there in order to discourage people from meeting what I consider to be a core ethical and moral obligation: that is, that we look out for one another; that is, I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper. And in the wealthiest nation in the world right now, we are neglecting to live up to that call.”

Why is mixing religion and government okay when Democrats do it? The answer is that liberals don’t believe they really mean it when they profess faith. They look at one and other, wink, nod and understand that Obama is merely using the language of tradition and mythology to assuage the weak minded masses. Unlike in the case of Bush’s sincere religious beliefs, the left is willing to accept Obama posing as a believer. After all, honoring America’s “historical religious traditions” is quite a bit different from, you know, actually believing that stuff. That’s for the bitter clingers in fly-over country.

Meanwhile, Iowa bishop R. Walker Nickless in a message issued by the Diocese of Sioux City, explains the position of the Catholic Church on Obamacare.

[T]he Catholic Church does not teach that government should directly provide health care.

Unlike a prudential concern like national defense, for which government monopolization is objectively good—it both limits violence overall and prevents the obvious abuses to which private armies are susceptible—health care should not be subject to federal monopolization.

Preserving patient choice (through a flourishing private sector) is the only way to prevent a health care monopoly from denying care arbitrarily, as we learned from HMOs in the recent past. While a government monopoly would not be motivated by profit, it would be motivated by such bureaucratic standards as quotas and defined “best procedures,” which are equally beyond the influence of most citizens. The proper role of the government is to regulate the private sector, in order to foster healthy competition and to curtail abuses. Therefore any legislation that undermines the viability of the private sector is suspect.

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