An appeal for sense in New York

New York turned down federal funding for abstinence education.

New York is rejecting millions of dollars in federal grants for abstinence-only sex education, the state health commissioner, Dr. Richard F. Daines, announced yesterday. The decision puts New York in line with at least 10 other states that have decided to forgo the federal money in recent years.

This is political. The state has received about three and a half million dollars a year for nearly a decade now for abstinence education, approved under president Clinton and continued under president Bush. But the health commisioner doesn’t like the program under president Bush. He said it’s “based on ideology.”

The state had also spent $2.6 million annually to fund the same programs over the last decade. That money will now be spent on other existing programs for sex education, Dr. Daines said in an interview.

What other programs for sex education? Are they free from “ideology”?

He said the state should encourage the teaching of the use of condoms and include discussions of abstinence.

So, abstinence should be an incidental inclusion into the encouragement of safe sex primarly focusing on condoms? And this is not based on an ideology?

“We think it is a good thing that they are making efforts to close programs that were misinforming adolescents,” said Galen Sherwin, the director of the Reproduction Rights Project for the New York Civil Liberties Union, who wrote the report .

How is abstinence education “misinforming adolescents”? So brushing it aside as incidental, these folks have concluded, is ‘informing’ young people better, according to the “Reproduction Rights Project.”

 “But there is still a long way to go before you get to comprehensive, medically sound sex education.”

This isn’t about the truth of the human person, contained in the teachings of Pope John Paul in Theology of the Body, among other truths. It’s wordplay, and it’s all about who controls the spin and who gets to define the terms.

Bill Donohue is appealing to the New York Senators for sense and reason here. 

I am appealing to you to introduce legislation that would reinstate the right of New York State to receive federal funding for abstinence-only sex education. This is needed because of the unilateral decision made by New York State Health Commissioner Dr. Richard F. Daines to reject $3.5 million a year in federal grants for such programs. His decision is not only without merit (he provided absolutely no evidence for his position), it would, if not overturned, have an adverse impact on Catholic institutions.

They seem to have been the targets of this move, with the companion ACLU report in that NYTimes article pointing out the religious based schools that got a fair share of the funding.

On p. 37 of its report, the NYCLU lists 17 religious-affiliated organizations that receive federal grants for abstinence programs. Fourteen of them, or 82 percent, are Roman Catholic institutions. Thus, it is evident that such entities would bear an undue burden if Dr. Daines’ decision were to go unchallenged. While his motive may be without religious bias, the effect of his ruling surely would not be. 

That’s a good and charitable way for Donohue to put it, giving Dr. Daines the benefit of a doubt. (All appearances and evidence notwithstanding.) 

If legislation is not passed restoring the status quo ante, Catholic institutions will be presented with a Hobson’s choice: either they violate their doctrinal prerogatives and accept the money, or they stick to principle and be punished for doing so. That is why I am urging you to do what you can to see to it that Catholic institutions are not penalized for being Catholic.

One of those senators is running for president. It will be interesting to see the response, and whether it’s spun.