Once upon a time in the Land of Oz, President Obama&#8217;s Health and Human Services nominee did a very regrettable thing.</p><p>Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius was photographed entertaining one of the nation&#8217;s most storied abortionists. Never mind that the two found themselves together because the man placed the highest bid at a fundraiser, the prize being a dinner at the governor&#8217;s mansion.</p><p>Photos of the 2007 affair, which show Sebelius being chummy with George Tiller, have been waved about as &#8220;proof&#8221; that she is in cahoots with baby killers. The photos, plus much background information on the event, are part of an elaborate Web campaign against Sebelius by abortion foes. You are likely to hear about this as Sebelius&#8217; nomination goes forward in Senate hearings.</p><p>Unfortunately, Sebelius finds herself on the wrong side not only of a bunch of prairie reactionaries but also of God himself &#8212; or at least of his earthly servant Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of the Diocese of Kansas City in Kansas.</p><p>&#8220;It saddens me that so many Catholics, to gain political advancement, have chosen to compromise their Catholic faith by their failure to defend the most fundamental of all human rights &#8212; the right to life,&#8221; Naumann wrote in a letter to the diocesan newspaper.</p><p>Naumann wrote that until Sebelius toed the line on church dogma concerning abortion, she should not receive the sacrament of communion.</p><p>Sebelius joined an ever-growing list of elected officials who have been criticized by the church, including former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Sen. John Kerry, Vice President Joe Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.</p><p>God forbid that I should tell the archbishop how to conduct himself. I agree with him that abortion is abhorrent and morally wrong.</p><p>Criminalizing it, however, will not stop the practice but only make it more deadly. For years, in the face of attacks, Sebelius has maintained that her Catholic faith is the basis of her belief that &#8220;life is sacred.&#8221; She insists her personal belief is that abortion is wrong.</p><p>As secretary of health and human services, Sebelius is likely to have the opportunity to make policy changes to reduce abortions by reducing unwanted pregnancies. One policy approach would be to make sure that contraception is available to all sexually active teens and adults, and that they know how to use it &#8212; in detail. That, too, would violate the church&#8217;s moral teaching.</p><p>But while the church can view 100 percent extramarital abstinence as a goal for the faithful, that&#8217;s hardly a realistic policy objective for a nation. If Naumann were to be as forceful with his views on all church doctrine, he would spend equal vigor denouncing politicians who tolerate the legality of condoms. Instead, he tries to scare the faithful with secularist conspiracy talk, as he did in the aforementioned letter: &#8220;Those advocating for abortion to be considered a &#8216;right&#8217; would love to see Catholic hospitals faced with the choice to either cooperate in providing abortions or close.&#8221;</p><p>To the extent that that is true, it is the desire of extremists, the ideological counterparts of those who are designing elaborate Web pages to condemn Sebelius as soft on baby killing. Most fair-minded Americans simply want the number of unwanted pregnancies to be lowered, which would also decrease abortions.</p><p>Interestingly enough, it was Gov. Sebelius who increased tax credits for adoption in Kansas &#8212; one of the reasons she can boast that abortions have dropped by more than 10 percent while she has been in office. She also funded efforts to educate women about options other than abortion. The Catholic Church has great moral influence in the United States, and that&#8217;s a good thing. But no church should dictate policy to our government. When church and state encroach on each other, it&#8217;s no good for either. The funny thing is, American Catholics used to understand that all too well.