Help For Faith-Based Adoption Agencies
By MIKE MANNO
The movement started in Massachusetts, the first state to legalize same-sex marriage. The concept of discrimination against same-sex couples took root there, forcing Catholic and Christian adoption agencies out of business when they refused to adopt to same-sex couples.
Following Massachusetts were bans in Illinois, San Francisco, the District of Columbia, California, and Philadelphia. The 2015 Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide gave rise to more legal challenges by the ACLU against private, Christian, and Catholic adoption services. Among others, suits have been filed in Michigan and Texas, challenging state laws, to force faith-based adoption agencies to serve homosexual and lesbian couples.
The response by conservative, faith-friendly state legislators was to pass state legislation protecting faith-based adoption and foster-care agencies from being forced to violate their sincerely held religious beliefs. Thus far nine states have legislated this protection: Virginia, Michigan, North Dakota, South Dakota, Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas, with Oklahoma and Kansas joining the list last month.
Nationally, Sen. Mike Enzi (R., Wyo.) and Cong. Mike Kelly (R., Pa.) have introduced in each house the Child Welfare Provider Inclusion Act of 2017, which attempts to provide federal protection for these faith-based agencies. Along with the main sponsors, there are seven Senate cosponsors and 13 co-sponsors in the House. All are Republicans. Currently the Senate bill is in the Senate Finance Committee and the House bill is in the House Subcommittee (of Ways and Means) on Human Resources.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) supports the legislation.
“Faith-based organizations have historically played a heroic role in caring for our country’s vulnerable kids. There is no good reason why any of these care providers should be disqualified from working with their government to serve American’s families simply because of deeply rooted religious beliefs,” Cong. Kelly said.
“All across the country, faith-based charities and organizations are working hard to find safe, loving, and permanent homes. This is wonderful work and we should encourage these organizations, not limiting their efforts because of their religious beliefs,” Sen. Enzi said.
The bill finds that: “Religious organizations have long been and should continue contracting with and receiving grants from governmental entities to provide child welfare services….Children and families benefit greatly from the child welfare services provided by religious organizations….[And that] Governmental entities and officials administering federally funded child welfare services in some states…have refused to contract with religious organizations that are unable, due to sincerely held religious beliefs or moral convictions, to provide child welfare service that conflicts…with those beliefs and convictions.”
Its purpose is: “To prohibit governmental entities from discriminating or taking adverse action against a child welfare service provider on the basis that the provider declines to provide a child welfare service that conflicts…with the sincerely held religious beliefs or moral convictions of the provider.” It therefore bans any discrimination against such providers for acting in accordance with their faith, and provides that federal funds can be withheld from states that do so.
The seriousness of the problem faced by these agencies was outlined in an analysis of the proposed act by attorney Travis Weber for the Family Research Council in April of this year.
“Religious organizations are heavily involved in adoption, and contribute especially in helping find homes for special needs children who are often difficult to place. As reported by the USCCB, ‘of the 3,794 completed adoptions by Catholic Charities agencies in 2009, 1,721 (45 percent) were children considered to have special needs. In the same year, 541 of 1,716 adoptions (32 percent) provided by Bethany Christian Services…were of hard-to-place older children previously in foster care.”
Catholic Charities, he reports, in one year alone (2014) served over 8.7 million in the U.S. with housing, food, and health care, job-placement, and refugee assistance and provided adoption services to over 45,000.
“Catholic Charities does much in the way of public service, yet the organization is still being threatened by government discrimination against its religious tenets. The charity has already been forced to stop assisting with adoptions in certain locations, and along with Bethany Christian Services and other providers, is at risk of being forced out of more.”
He also pointed out that the USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services aid to survivors of human trafficking was discontinued by the Obama administration because the bishops would not also agree to provide referrals for abortion and other “reproductive health services.”
“Regardless of what one thinks on these issues, what is clear is that many who support redefinitions of family and marriage are imposing their views on others by means of government power. Despite the amazing work, and the thousands of children and families helped by faith-based adoption providers, we have seen a shocking promotion of anti-faith policies that has negatively impacted the well-being of children and families, and in addition constitutes a direct assault on religious entities,” Weber stated.
The analysis also reported on the declining number of adoptions taking place in jurisdictions where negative action against faith-based providers has been taken, while there are a growing number of children waiting for placement. In Massachusetts the report found that “instead of trying to care for those kids [waiting for adoption], the state was busy shutting down providers who could help them.”
Continuing, “When kids should be matched with families, they are instead being displaced by activists who simply don’t like the beliefs of the agencies. Forcing out providers for this reason is simple bigotry against religion.”
The Heritage Foundation, which also supports the bill, stated: “No adoption agency should be penalized by the state because they work to find children homes with a married mom and dad. Shutting down agencies or disqualifying them from government programs because they believe kids deserve both a mom and dad does nothing to help children in need. All it does is score a point for LGBT activists using children as pawns in their culture war.”
The Senate number for the bill is S 811. The companion bill in the House is HR 1881. It surely would be worth your time to contact your senators and representative and ask that they support passage of the legislation. We need to support the religious groups who work so hard to help the poor, needy, and lost. It will also help a kid that you will probably never meet — at least here on Earth.
You can contact Mike at Deacon
Mike@q.com.
