Fox & Friends recently criticized the media for "taking sides." But on yesterday's happy morning chat show, Fr. Jonathan Morris' one sided attack on the ACLU, over its lawsuit against Catholic hospitals that refuse to provide emergency abortions, clearly demonstrated that, OMG, Fox News takes sides, too
Anna Kooiman immediately set the "Fight for Faith" message which is straight out of the playbook of the anti-choice, right wing US Conference of Catholic bishops: "Catholic hospitals are under attack because of their religious beliefs." She reported that the evil Jesus hating ACLU is suing a Catholic health care health system because "they [ACLU] say that these hospitals are putting women at risk." (Ya think!)She asked "should they have [Trinity Health Corporation] to go against their own beliefs." The banner reinforced this issue as a "Fight Over Faith."
Anti-choicer Tucker Carlson, who has slut shamed single women who do give birth, asked resident Fox priest and right wing mouthpiece Fr. Jonathan Morris if it's possible that the nasty ACLU could force Catholic hospitals to provide abortion. Morris said it is very possible because "we have already seen the federal government trying to force religious institutions to do things against their beliefs." He cited the HHS birth control mandate - an issue on which Fox News took the side of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. Morris asked "what about conscientious objection?"
Clayton Morris read the ACLU's statement that if a woman is in an emergency room, she should get the necessary care. Fr. Morris said that there is always "a digestible explanation" and asked "what does the ACLU want?" In keeping with the Fox & Friends ongoing propaganda message about how the ACLU hates Christians, Morris, rather than addressing the issue that *WOMEN CAN DIE, Fr. Morris attacked the ACLU: "The ACLU wants no religious beliefs whatsoever to get in the way of their objectives, their goals, their ideology." (No, padre, the ACLU wants to protect women from unnecessarily dying!)
Morris got quite dramatic when he said that the ACLU would be happy if Catholic hospitals were forced to do full term abortions. After he claimed that this is a case of "incremental pursuit of their objectives," he noted that Catholic doctors do what they can to save the life of the mother even if the fetus dies. What he didn't mention is that, according to his Church, all abortions, even those to save the life of the mother, are wrong. Catholic hospitals, according to guidelines, are prohibited from performing an abortion even in the case of an ectopic pregnancy. In other words, women needing emergency abortions, at a Catholic hospital, will die and that's where the ACLU comes in.
Rather than discuss the ACLU's contention that Trinity Health Corporation engages in "a repeated and systematic failure to provide patients experiencing pregnancy complications with appropriate emergency reproductive health care," Morris continued to attack the ACLU who, he claimed, "wants no religious belief." He made the irrelevent claim that the ACLU doesn't see the fetus as a patient. Carlson: "or a human being." Morris was almost histrionic as he claimed that "the ACLU wants doctors to kill fetuses in order to protect the life of the mother." (And that's a problem how?) Carlson summed it up: "It's worth fighting for. If they can force this on the Catholic Church, what can't they do."
This being Fox & Friends, nobody mentioned the ethics of allowing the Catholic Church, which takes Federal dollars, to allow its beliefs to endanger women's lives. Nobody questioned the issue of whether the Catholic Church of doctors should make crucial medical decisions on women's lives. Talk about "a digestible explanation!"
*See the case of Savita Halappanavar whose death was the result of Irish anti-abortion laws based on Catholic beliefs.