Last Sunday I along with the clergy and clergy organizations which constitute the African American Clergy Collective of Tennessee which is a 501(c)4 advocacy organization of black clergy across this state began sharing a weekly update called “Facts and Faith in Five”. Our intent is to help us sort through the barrage of actions taken by the current federal administration and offer a black faith perspective to help us to carve a pathway to hope in increasingly frustrating times.
This Sunday, we are curious about the assertion by the current president and his administration that they will make America Healthy again.
This week Health and Human Services Secretary RFK, Jr. sat for Congressional hearings where he answer for the 20,000 employees that he let go and his proposal to cut funding from the National Institutes of Health which is the entity of our federal government that supports and conducts biomedical research. They were at work on research to treat childhood cancer, dementia and stroke. But these initiatives have either been slowed or stopped.
But what is even a greater threat are the proposal that $880 billion be cut from Medicaid to cover the $4.5 trillion in proposed tax breaks. According to reporting by PBS, while republicans “insist that are simply rooting out “waste, fraud and abuse” to generate savings with new work and eligibility requirements, Democrats warn that millions of Americans will lose coverage. A preliminary estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the proposals would reduce the number of people with health care by 8.6 million over the decade.”
Just to be clear, while Medicare is a federal program focuses on the health care coverage of persons 65 and old, Medicaid is a joint federal and state program that helps cover medical costs for some people with limited income and resources. The federal government has general rules that all state Medicaid programs must follow, but each state runs its own program. This means eligibility requirements and benefits can vary from state to state Medicaid offers benefits that Medicare doesn’t normally cover, like nursing home care and personal care services. People with Medicaid usually don’t pay anything for covered medical expenses but may owe a small co-payment for some items or services.
Since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, the State of Tennessee as opted not to expand Medicaid and as a result, over 300,000 Tennesseans are uninsured with no access to healthcare.
You can not call yourself a Christian and advocate for the denial of health care to those who are most vulnerable and who can not afford it. The scriptures demonstrate the importance of healing in that in the New Testament alone there are 51 distinct accounts of healing in Scripture. But God not only heals by miracles, God also heals through medicine. Scripture indicts pseudo-Christians, when in 1 John 4, 20-21 it says, “ If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother. So we urge you to please contact your representatives in the US Congress and US Senate and urge them to keep their hands off Medicaid.