Court decision protects religious healthcare workers

A federal judge last week struck down an Obama-era regulation that required medical professionals to perform abortions and gender-transition procedures despite their religious convictions. The decision comes as a relief to Christian physicians like Mike Chupp, a general surgeon in Bristol, Tenn. Chupp, who is also CEO of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations (CMDA) said that if the 2017 rule stood, it might have required him to perform surgeries against his Christian convictions such as a mastectomy on a teenage girl who identified as a boy.

“We would have been in a world of hurt as Christians because we would have been thinking about leaving our practices or limiting our practices so as not to be in a bind,” Chupp said.

The recent ruling by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor of Texas, an appointee of President George W. Bush, made permanent a 2017 order blocking a part of the Affordable Care Act barring discrimination in healthcare on the basis of “gender identity and termination of pregnancy.” O’Connor’s ruling sends the matter back to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for reconsideration. That should not prove difficult for the agency: Last May, the Trump administration proposed a new rule that would preserve the right of health professionals and insurers to decline to perform or pay for the objectionable procedures.

A group of states and religious plaintiffs, including the Franciscan Alliance and the CMDA—all represented by Becket—filed the lawsuit in August 2017. The court found the regulation outside the scope of HHS rule-making authority and said it violated the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

Medical professionals may breathe easier after the decision, but the American Civil Liberties Union and the River City Gender Alliance might keep fighting on appeal. The case could affect how the Supreme Court rules in twin cases that were argued earlier this month. In Harris Funeral Homes v. EEOC, the court is considering whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits employment discrimination based on sex, covers gender identity. And in its companion case, Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, the justices must decide if Title VII bars discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Chupp said patients need Christian doctors to stay in the field of medicine. “Christians take care of the poor, take lower salaries, take care of refugees, and take care of those on the fringe who are uninsured,” he said. “That’s why religious freedom is just so critical for us to protect.”