Obama’s Birth Control Mandate Sparks Backlash from Churches ✝️

Artificial birth control may well have been legal in the US for almost half a century, but it is a controversial topic that could influence the race to the White House.<br /><br />The healthcare plan of Barack Obama, the US president, has again come under fire, this time over a proposal to include free birth control in religious institutions.<br /><br />Obama has antagonised the Roman Catholic church by ordering it to offer its employees free contraceptive coverage under his new health insurance law.<br /><br />Though the president modified that order, by having the church's insurance companies be the direct contraceptive providers, the church is still resisting.<br /><br />When Republicans convened a Capitol Hill hearing on the issue, all the invited witnesses were male religious spokesmen.<br /><br />Al Jazeera's Tom Ackerman reports from Washington.