Cardinal Francis George of Chicago, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, made the call March 23, moments after president Barack Obama signed the Senate version of health care reform legislation approved by the House of Representatives by a slim margin, March 21. The statement was approved unanimously by the 32-member Administrative Committee of the USCCB.

"We applaud the effort to expand health care to all," Cardinal George said.

He noted concerns about the legislation, including that "the statute forces all those who choose federally subsidized plans that cover abortion to pay for other peoples abortions with their own funds."

The California Catholic Conference has prepared this FAQ sheet.

USCCB has released a series of analyses of the final health care reform legislation:

• This summary piece focuses on abortion language in the final version of the bill.
• A 13-page analysis of life and conscience issues in the final bill is available here.
• The USCCB's Office of General Council has provided this legal analysis of the health care reform bill and the Executive Order.  Click here to read the entire document.

Commentary by Sister Mary Ann Walsh, Director of Media Relations, USCCB

The heat in the aftermath of passage of health care reform reveals the depth of feeling among those for and against the landmark bill that affects all Americans. Such heat, however, cannot justify the verbal and physical violence that has ensued.

If we needed health care because of the crisis affecting the sick, especially the weakest among us, we need even more a move toward civility, if not for our own betterment then at least for the betterment of our children.

Politics has become a kind of blood sport. News junkies over the weekend heard reports of crowds shouting racist remarks and individuals spitting at African American lawmakers, including John Lewis, who suffered violence years ago when he marched for Civil Rights. Surely he—and all of us—has a right to expect that that chapter of despicable, racist violence long over.

By Rev. Richard Benson, C.M.

Does an embryo have a soul? Isn't society justified in putting to death a criminal that has committed a capital crime? Why should taxpayers have to support health care and schooling for undocumented children? Why didn't Pope John Paul II agree to call President Bush's invasion of Iraq a "just war"? When did health care become a "right"?

All of these apparently unconnected questions actually involve the same central Catholic moral principle, the consistent ethic of life. This principle is often associated with Cardinal Joseph Bernardin’s 1983 proposal of the “seamless garment” analogy, a reference from John 19:23 to the seamless robe of Jesus, to provide a moral compass to help Catholics apply moral principles to life issues present in the public square.

Cardinal Bernardin suggested that a consistent ethic of life might be the most effective approach in addressing issues dealing with human life and dignity in a modern society more and more identified with the “culture of death.” His seamless garment approach suggests that all life issues such as abortion, capital punishment, euthanasia, social injustice, racism, prejudice, poverty, unjust war and economic injustice are most effectively confronted when done so with a consistent application of moral principles that are firmly founded on the intrinsic value of human life.