(BECKET LAW) – The federal government recently told a Catholic hospital in Oklahoma to either blow out a small candle or stop serving elderly, disabled, and low-income patients. Saint Francis Health System, the twelfth largest hospital in the nation, keeps, with many prudent safeguards, a sacred candle always lit inside its hospital chapels, in accordance with its Catholic faith. After a hospital inspection in February, the government said a single candle was too dangerous and now threatens to strip the hospital of the ability to accept Medicare, Medicaid, or CHIP if it does not extinguish the flame. Becket sent a letter to the Biden administration reminding it that Saint Francis has the right to religious freedom and warning federal bureaucrats to leave the candle alone.
Saint Francis Health System is a premiere health system with five hospitals in Eastern Oklahoma. The health system cares for nearly 400,000 patients each year, has given away more than $650 million dollars in free medical care in the past five years, and employs more than 11,000 Oklahomans. Saint Francis’s mission is to extend the presence and healing ministry of Christ. In addition to providing compassionate and top-notch care to its patients, Saint Francis lives out its religious mission by maintaining multiple chapels throughout its hospitals, each of which has been blessed by the local Bishop.
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Since Saint Francis opened its doors in 1960, the health system has had a sanctuary candle with a living flame as an act of worship. The flame, far removed from medical equipment and patients, is shielded by two glass holders, sits on a brass basin, is affixed to a wall and has a brass top covering it, with many sprinkler heads above it. For Catholics, the living flame is a sign of the living presence of Jesus. The federal government now threatens to tell all patients who rely on Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP that they can no longer receive care at Saint Francis – all over a candle.
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