This open thread is meant for commenters to post on items either briefly noted below (if any) or otherwise not covered at this blog. Rules are here.

From Charlotte, North Carolina:

Oct 11, 2017 / 03:59 pm

It has been six years since Belmont Abbey College, a Catholic liberal arts school near Charlotte, North Carolina, filed the first lawsuit challenging the federal contraception mandate.

“It’s hard to believe it’s gone on for this long,” college president William Thierfelder told CNA Oct. 9.

Last week, the Trump administration announced revisions to the HHS mandate, a regulation introduced by the Obama administration that required employers to fund employee health care plans covering contraception, sterilization, and some drugs that can cause early abortions.

The revisions considerably expand exemptions for religious groups and others with moral or ethical objections to the demands of the mandate.

Thierfelder said he is grateful that the current administration has acknowledged the original mandate as violating the right to religious freedom and is taking action to correct it.
(more…)