“We believe that the alliance will be an instrument of greater collaboration of best practices within Catholic health care,” said Louis Brown.
Peter Jesserer Smith | News | January 20, 2022
WASHINGTON — As the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services prepares new sweeping mandates that could devastate Catholic health providers, five major Catholic organizations have created a new broad-based coalition that unites their expertise in law, medicine, ethics and public policy to protect and advance Catholic health care rooted in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
On Jan. 20, the Catholic Medical Association, the National Catholic Bioethics Center, the Catholic Benefits Association, the Catholic Bar Association, and the Christ Medicus Foundation launched the Catholic Health Care Leadership Alliance (CHCLA) with an introductory event at Hillsdale College’s Kirby Center in Washington, D.C.
The alliance’s mission is to “support the rights of patients and professionals to receive and provide health care in accordance with the moral, ethical, and social teachings of Jesus Christ and His Church.”
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Bishop Conley said his hope is that the alliance “will be able to be a place for people to go, whether they be bishops, pastors, healthcare leaders, small upstart Catholic clinics.”
“We want to do everything we can to help those involved in health care to keep their eyes on Jesus and continue to teach and witness to the beautiful vision of the human person,” he said.
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Louis Brown, executive director of the Christ Medicus Foundation and its representative at the alliance, told the Register the Catholic Health Care Leadership Alliance foundations were laid in earnest more than a year ago, after Bishop Conley initiated conversations about the need for a united organization with this vision.
“We believe that the alliance will be an instrument of greater collaboration of best practices within Catholic health care,” he said. “We believe the alliance will be an instrument of assisting various Catholic health-care entities in growing in their Catholic mission and identity.”
Brown, who served the HHS from 2017-2019, added the alliance will also “provide an important voice for defending the civil rights of medical conscience and religious freedom at the federal level as well as the state level.”
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For additional information on the importance of the new Catholic Health Care Leadership Alliance, read CMF’s press release.