Cornerstone University promotes building “a life that matters” — which to them does not include supplying employees with birth control, sterilization, and abortifacients. The Michigan school filed jointly against Obamacare's HHS Mandate Wednesday alongside of Iowa’s Dordt College.
According to the complaint:
“The Schools are Christ-centered institutions of higher learning. They believe that God has condemned the intentional destruction of innocent human life. The Schools hold, as a matter of religious conviction, that it would be sinful and immoral for them intentionally to participate in, pay for, facilitate, enable, or otherwise support access to abortion, which destroys human life. They hold that one of the prohibitions of the Ten Commandments (“thou shalt not murder”) precludes them from facilitating, assisting in, or enabling the use of drugs that can and do destroy very young human beings in the womb.”
The suit is merely an effort to preserve the religious freedom guaranteed to Americans under the First Amendment, according Cornerstone President Joseph Stowell.
The suit claimed the government violated seven laws including the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the First and Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution and the Administrative Procedure Act.
“Given our conviction that life begins at conception and our commitment to the sanctity of life, we find the mandate to provide our faculty, staff and students with insurance that provides access to abortion-inducing prescriptions unacceptable,” Stowell stated.
Notre Dame, Biola, Wheaton, Colorado Christian, Belmont Abbey, Nazarene, East Texas Baptist and Dordt are among some of the additional colleges and universities fighting for exemption.
Even outside of the academic realm, dozens have felt pressured to compromise their personal values due to the Affordable Care Act. Lawsuits range from a Roman Catholic order to private businesses such as Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood.