The Right to Choose

Re “Merger Mania Is Blocking Reproductive Choice,” April 18.

Rep. [Sheila] Kuehl claims to be concerned about everyone’s right to choose except for those who make a choice different from her own. Women, it would seem, have the right to abortion, but Catholics, who also pay their taxes, vote, etc., do not have the right to exercise their faith in their own institutions.

Sorry, Rep. Kuehl, but in a pluralistic society the majority does not have the right to tyrannize the minority, or subject them to oppressive measures, such as your AB 525, which [would] deny them the opportunity to authentically live out their faith. If the demand for the services you are worried about (contraception, sterilization, medically necessary tubal ligation, fertility treatment and abortion) is as great as you seem to think, then our free marketplace will see to it that those services are available.

Fear not. Rather fear that your attempt to force everyone to accept and live by your values, popular or not, is an infringement on the free exercise of religion found in the Constitution of the United States.

FR. PATRICK MULLEN, Berkeley