Religious nonprofits unhappy with birth-control exemption challenge health law
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}FILE - In this Thursday Jan. 2, 2014, file photo, Mother Patricia Mary walks in the hallway at the Mullen Home for the Aged, run by Little Sisters of the Poor, in Denver. Faith-based nonprofit organizations that object to covering birth control in their employee health plans are in federal court Monday, Dec. 8, 2014, to challenge a birth-control compromise they say still compels them to violate their religious beliefs. The plaintiffs include the group of Denver nuns known as the Little Sisters of the Poor, who run more than two dozen nursing homes for impoverished seniors. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, File) (The Associated Press)
Faith-based nonprofit organizations that object to covering birth control in their employee health plans are in federal court Monday challenging a birth-control compromise they say still compels them to violate their religious beliefs.
The plaintiffs include a group of Colorado nuns and four Christian colleges in Oklahoma. They are already exempt from covering contraceptives under the federal health care law.
But they say the exemption doesn't go far enough because they must sign something to get the exemption, making them complicit in the contraceptives coverage.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The groups are appealing to the 10th Circuit in Denver. That's the court that ruled last year that for-profit companies can join the exempted religious organizations and not provide the contraceptives.
The U.S. Supreme Court later agreed in the case brought by the Hobby Lobby arts-and-crafts chain.