The Vatican’s Chief Justice, Cardinal Raymond Burke, has leveled a striking charge against President Barack Obama. Burke, who was formerly the St. Louis, MO archbishop, told Polonia Christiana magazine that Obama is trying to “restrict” Christianity.
“It is true that the policies of the president of the United States have become progressively more hostile toward Christian civilization. He appears to be a totally secularized man who aggressively promotes anti-life and anti-family policies,” Burke said.
Burke noted that Obama is fine with “freedom of worship,” but restricts what Christians may do outside their churches: “Now he wants to restrict the exercise of the freedom of religion to freedom of worship, that is, he holds that one is free to act according to his conscience within the confines of his place of worship but that, once the person leaves the place of worship, the government can constrain him to act against his rightly-formed conscience, even in the most serious of moral questions.”
Leftists like Obama increasingly defend the “freedom of worship” while at the same time supporting and passing laws that force Christians into violating their consciences in their daily lives. That’s what Cardinal Burke is addressing. The Hobby Lobby lawsuit is such a case. The Green family who owns Hobby Lobby are Christians, and while through their company health insurance they have provided multiple forms of birth control for years, they object to the abortifacient drugs that Obamacare forces them to pay for. Rather than recognize or accomodate their faith, the Obama administration has forced them to fight in court. The Obama administration has forced the Catholic Little Sisters of the Poor to do likewise.
Obama and his type are fine with Christians who are only faithful when they’re inside the church walls. He is putting himself into conflict with the basic teachings of Christianity itself, though, which calls for Christians to be more than Sunday and Wednesday worshipers.
Obama meets with Pope Francis later this week. The cardinal’s comments signal that the pope may bring this issue up with the president.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member