(Bloomberg) -- The Obama administration won a reversal of acourt ruling that would have shielded a Christian college from aprovision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Actrequiring religious nonprofits to indirectly facilitatecontraceptive coverage even if they oppose the use because of theirfaith.

Nonprofit religious groups can claim an exception under thehealth care act that offers coverage for contraceptives through aninsurance plan or a third-party administrator. The accommodation tothe contraceptive-coverage provision, whichrequires nonprofits to notify their insurers, places “nosubstantial burden” on the college, the U.S. Court of Appeals inPhiladelphia ruled Wednesday, overturning a lower-court judge.

Geneva College in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, argued that theaccommodation forces it to trigger the provision of insurancecoverage for contraceptive services to which it is opposed onreligious grounds. The very act of notifying its insurer through aself-certification form requires the college to be “complicit” insin, according to court papers.

The appeals court disagreed. The law provides an “opt-outmechanism” that shifts to third parties the obligation to providecontraceptive coverage allowing religious groups to wash theirhands of any involvement, the court ruled.

“The regulations accommodate the interests of religiousinstitutions that provide health services, while not curtailing thepublic interest that motivates the federally mandated requirementthat such services shall be provided to women free of charge,” thecourt said in its ruling.

The court ruling also covers two Catholic dioceses that hadchallenged the provision.

The case is Geneva College v. Secretary of U.S. Department ofHealth and Human Services, 13-3536, U.S. Court of Appeals for theThird Circuit (Philadelphia).

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