Protecting Catholic employers has become increasingly difficult in today’s political climate. Employers are faced with unique cultural and legal challenges, many of which come in the form of government mandates on health care benefits. But these same employers have a unique, additional responsibility of ensuring a strong Catholic Identity.
Catholic employers, who are self-funded, can no longer take a “set it and forget it” approach to their benefits plan structure. They must stay engaged on all levels of healthcare benefits to prevent additional financial and cultural risks associated with compromising and providing services that are counter to their faith.
A most recent example of covering benefits that conflict with our faith involved a Catholic University that was offering abortions within its student health plans: Check out the story HERE.
Active awareness is the key to identifying the dangers lurking for Catholic employer. Below we discuss the five dangers and how you can arm yourself to eliminate them.
1. Insurance Standardization
While the standardization of health plans is good for insurance companies, it can have an adverse impact for Catholic employers. Insurance standards never align perfectly with our Catholic faith, so it’s important to ensure adequate attention is placed on both, faith and healthcare. When standardization is not addressed, Catholic employers become exposed to offering benefits that run counter to their faith. This erodes their Catholic identity and produces an effect of merely accommodating faith versus providing a truly, authentic Catholic experience.
2. Disordered Culture
Workplace culture is often referred to as the “pulse” of the company, a steady drumbeat formed of common goals, values, expectations and mission. A strong workplace culture establishes the company identity, lifts employee morale and drives production. As our societal culture shifts, it’s important to refocus your attention to benefit offerings and ensure they are supportive of your organizational culture and faith. Many employers will increase their efforts on health and wellbeing to aid morale and employee happiness, but Catholic employers know that true happiness in found in God alone. Supporting this through an authentic Catholic health plan experience is critical.
3. Risk Exposure
As the government enters further into the healthcare and health plan space, you will see more mandates on the coverage that is offered. Recently, the Catholic Benefits Association (CBA) uncovered a plan by the Health and Human Services (HHS) Department to mandate abortion and transgender services in most health plans. (Learn more HERE).
Aligning your benefits with your Catholic identity and the teachings of the Catholic church is important to ensure further risk of legal and political advancements are eliminated. Auditing health plans annually against the health plan language has become necessary, as insurance companies continue to change and flex to the mandates from the government. Allowing those changes to drift into Catholic health plans can expose Catholic employers to financial and cultural risks.
4. Mission Drift
Galvanize your mission by focusing on improving Catholic Identity within your health and wellness benefit offerings. As Catholics, we’re very concerned about the services that should not be covered, but what about all the good Catholic benefits out there that we should be covering. Does your plan cover Natural Family Planning, Marriage counseling/support or NaProTechnology services? Why not? By improving the Catholic Identity of your Catholic health plans, you strengthen your organizational mission and cultural identity. Being fully supportive of the services that align with our faith drives a stronger, more authentic Catholic health plan experience.
5. Unhealthy Employee Experience
Living an authentically Catholic lifestyle is important for Catholic employees and their families. Many seek health benefit plan options that help them achieve this lifestyle. Today’s current insurance plan options fail to offer this to individual Catholics and their families, who are left seeking good quality options. Larger, self-funded Catholic employers who can create this experience offer a unique talent acquisition opportunity by doing so. Rewarding employees by focusing on their faith increases productivity, loyalty, and improves mental, physical, and spiritual health and wellbeing.
The feedback from employees who have experienced this firsthand confirm their desire for this type of experience:
- “I just want to say THANK YOU for this change!!! I could tell (our prior carrier) wasn’t totally aligned with our values and I feel soooo much better about my healthcare now that we’re moving forward with this.”
- “Thanks for helping to provide a Catholic Insurance option for us!”
As our country’s culture continues to shift, Catholic employers must increase the awareness of how this shift is affecting their employee health and benefit offerings. Shifting focus to what’s in their health plan is critical. It’s also important to know you are not in this alone.
Catholic Benefits Association can help by protecting from government mandates, eliminating risks lurking in health plan language and benefits, and providing guidance on an authentic, Catholic health experience.