Marine One with President Joe Biden on board prepares to land at Walter Reed Nationwide Army Medical Middle in Bethesda, Md., Thursday, July 29, 2021. Walter Reed is on the middle of a heated non secular freedom battle. Susan Walsh, Related Press
A bunch of Franciscan monks just lately misplaced a contract to supply pastoral care to sufferers at Walter Reed Nationwide Army Medical Middle. After they tried to withstand the change and hold working throughout Holy Week, they had been served with a cease-and-desist order.
Now, administration at Walter Reed is going through pushback not just for kicking the monks out so near Easter, but in addition for selecting to companion with a secular protection contractor for future pastoral care providers, in accordance with The Related Press. Prime Catholic leaders, elected officers and non secular liberty attorneys have all expressed concern about Walter Reed’s current strikes.
“It's incomprehensible that important pastoral care is taken away from the sick and the aged when it was so available. It is a basic case the place the adage ‘If it's not damaged, don't repair it’ applies,” mentioned the Rev. Timothy P. Broglio, archbishop for army providers, in an April 7 assertion.
He added that Walter Reed was threatening sufferers’ non secular train rights in hopes of saving cash.
“I worry that giving a contract to the bottom bidder missed the truth that the bidder can't present the required service. I earnestly hope that this disdain for the sick will probably be remedied without delay and their First Modification rights will probably be revered,” he mentioned.
In a letter to high army officers within the Biden administration, attorneys from First Liberty Institute drew related conclusions, arguing that Walter Reed is legally obligated to supply service members with entry to Catholic monks.
“The division’s determination is each legally and morally incorrect,” the letter mentioned.
Walter Reed officers declined to share particulars of the outdated and new contracts with The Related Press. In addition they wouldn’t say whether or not the providers offered by monks from Holy Title School Friary in Silver Spring, Maryland, had been unsatisfactory not directly.
They did say that Catholic sufferers acquired pastoral care throughout Holy Week from an Military priest who's on employees at Walter Reed. Officers additionally famous that the brand new contract with Mack International LLC is below overview.
Walter Reed “honors and helps a full vary of spiritual, non secular, and cultural wants,” members of the administration crew mentioned in a press release, in accordance with The Related Press.
Mack International, the recipient of the brand new contract, is a Virginia-based agency that gives quite a lot of providers to the U.S. army and different authorities businesses, in accordance with Catholic Information Company.
“The non secular staffing providers part of the Mack International web site says the corporate helps present employees for ‘chapel help, non secular schooling coordinators, non-personal chapel help, hospice chaplains, and different non secular employees,’” the article mentioned.
Earlier than Mack International was given a contract, Franciscan monks from Holy Title School Friary had been serving Walter Reed for almost 20 years, The Related Press reported.