Belmont Abbey College has filed a broad legal challenge to the part of President Barack Obama's health care reforms that requires employer insurance plans to cover contraception and other birth control.

The Catholic college in Gaston County says the federal mandate forces religious institutions opposed to birth control to violate their beliefs or face penalties. The rule goes into effect next August.

The school has sued a number of federal agencies. The defendants include Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Keith Maley, an HHS spokesman, said the agency doesn't comment on pending litigation.

The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit, public-interest law firm.

The debate began in 2007, when a group of Belmont Abbey faculty members challenged the school's refusal to include prescription contraceptives in its health care plan.

In 2009, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruled that Belmont Abbey was violating federal law.

The school's recent suit focuses on Obama's 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which requires preventative health coverage on procedures like mammograms and cervical screenings, along with contraception and sterilizations.

A religious organization can be exempted if its spiritual values are central to its mission and if it primarily employs or serves "people who share its religious tenets."

In their 2007 complaint, the faculty members said the school did not meet similar state and federal standards in place at that time.

The school has about 1,700 students and 200 full-time employees. Not all are Catholic.

Religious leaders across the country have criticized the federal exemption criteria as narrowly drawn and nearly impossible to meet. Researcher Maria David contributed.