Biden admin. has 'seen the light,' backs down in battle over Catholic hospital's sanctuary candle
The Biden administration has decided to allow a Catholic hospital to keep its sanctuary candle lit after initially demanding that the hospital blow out the flame due to concerns over it being a fire hazard.
In a Friday tweet, Lori Windham, vice president and senior counsel at the law firm Becket, revealed that the United States Department of Health and Human Services informed the St. Francis Health System in Oklahoma that it can keep its sacred candle lit.
"The government has seen the light and has abandoned its attempt to force an Oklahoma hospital to blow out a small candle or stop serving elderly, disabled, and low-income patients. @HHSGov has told Saint Francis that it can keep its living flame — a sacred candle housed in the hospital chapels."
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#BREAKING: The government has seen the light and has abandoned its attempt to force an Oklahoma hospital to blow out a small candle or stop serving elderly, disabled, and low-income patients. @HHSGov has told Saint Francis that it can keep its living flame—a sacred candle housed… pic.twitter.com/1bkpjqi19M
— LoriWindham (@LoriWindham1) May 5, 2023
“The government knew it was playing with fire — today it announced its decision to allow the living flame so Saint Francis can continue to serve God and its community, as it always has,” Windham tweeted.
HHS’ Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services sent a letter on Thursday to Michael J. Lissau, senior vice president and general counsel of the St. Francis Health System, agreeing to provide the St. Francis South Hospital with a waiver for the living flame located in the hospital’s chapel.
“This waiver is contingent upon the hospital providing a plan of correction to [The Joint Commission] that includes taking some simple, appropriate steps to mitigate fire risks,” the letter reads. The Joint Commission is an accrediting organization that determines if proper conditions for Medicare and Medicaid are met at facilities seeking to care for patients who use the federal programs.
Recommended steps included “signage posted outside or in the chapel warning patients, visitors, and staff of keeping oxygen equipment and their delivery devices sufficiently far from any flame in the chapel” and “the use of a rope or other barrier to serve as a secondary mitigation measure.”
Lissau responded in a letter sent Friday, questioning how the encased candle ever qualified as an open flame and why concerns about the candle even existed, since it “was not an issue before this year.”
As Becket explained in a statement Friday, St. Francis keeps the candle lit inside one of its chapels as a symbol of the living presence of Jesus, following Catholic Church teaching. It is encased in two glass globes with a bronze cover on top. The candle holder is affixed to the wall and the chapel ceiling has multiple sprinkler heads.
In February, a surveyor from The Joint Commission of CMS visited St. Francis and concluded that the sanctuary candle was a violation of standards on fire safety. CMS agreed with the surveyor’s conclusion and sent a letter on April 20 advising the facility to correct it after the hospital requested an appeal and reconsideration regarding the citation. If the hospital did not address the Joint Commission’s concern, it would have lost the ability to provide for patients who use Medicare and Medicaid.
Earlier this week, Becket sent a letter to HHS and other government agencies on behalf of the Catholic hospital, accusing the government agencies of violating the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the First Amendment rights of the St. Francis Health System in addition to promising to file an emergency lawsuit it the agencies did not “cease and desist.”
For its part, a CMS spokesperson informed The Christian Post on Thursday that an independent accrediting organization made the safety finding about the fire risk. CMS stated that it was “working with the hospital’s accrediting organization to develop options to mitigate the potential fire risk and remove the safety finding.”
During the safety inspection, the surveyor saw “a lit candle with an open flame burning unattended 24/7” and he believed it violated the requirement for candles to be “placed in a substantial candle holder and supervised at all times they are lighted.”
“The government’s demand is absurd and unlawful — it is targeting Saint Francis’ sincere beliefs without any good reason,” Windham said in a statement published before CMS approved the waiver. “The government has a simple choice: either stop this attack on Saint Francis’ faith or expect a legal firestorm.”
Samantha Kamman is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: samantha.kamman@christianpost.com. Follow her on Twitter: @Samantha_Kamman
