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Supreme Court rules Christian foster agency can't be forced
to place kids with same-sex couples
By Michael Gryboski, Christian Post Reporter
Thursday, June 17, 2021
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the city of Philadelphia can't exclude a Catholic charity from its foster program because the organization won't place children with same-sex couples in accordance with religious beliefs.
In a unanimous decision released Thursday morning in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, the high court ruled city officials were wrong to quit working with Catholic Social Services of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia for refusing on religious grounds to place children with same-sex couples.
The decision reversed a judgment of a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and remanded it for further proceedings.
Chief Justice John Roberts delivered the court's opinion, concluding that “the City has burdened the religious exercise of CSS through policies that do not meet the requirement of being neutral and generally applicable.”
“Government fails to act neutrally when it proceeds in a manner intolerant of religious beliefs or restricts practices because of their religious nature,” wrote Roberts.
“The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment.”
Roberts also pointed out that Philadelphia can grant an exemption from the city's anti-discrimination policies to CSS, noting that city contracts include many exemptions.
“Once properly narrowed, the City’s asserted interests are insufficient. Maximizing the number of foster families and minimizing liability are important goals, but the City fails to show that granting CSS an exception will put those goals at risk,” continued Roberts.
“The creation of a system of exceptions under the contract undermines the City’s contention that its nondiscrimination policies can brook no departures.”
The opinion refutes the notion that fostering children is tantamount to a public accommodation.
"Certification as a foster parent, by contrast, is not readily accessible to the public," the opinion reads. "It involves a customized and selective assessment that bears little resemblance to staying in a hotel, eating at a restaurant, or riding a bus."
"As the City itself explains to prospective foster parents, '[e]ach agency has slightly different requirements, specialties, and training programs,'" Roberts wrote. "All of this confirms that the one-size-fits-all public accommodations model is a poor match for the foster care system."
In addition to the court opinion, there were also multiple concurring opinions.
Although Alito concurred in the judgment, he expressed concern that the Supreme Court decision will not have a lasting impact on the dispute between Philadelphia and CSS.
“The City has been adamant about pressuring CSS to give in, and if the City wants to get around today’s decision, it can simply eliminate the never-used exemption power,” wrote Alito in a concurring opinion joined by conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch.
“Not only is the Court’s decision unlikely to resolve the present dispute, it provides no guidance regarding similar controversies in other jurisdictions.”
In 2018, Philadelphia stopped placing children in the homes of foster parents affiliated with CSS and Bethany Christian Services of Greater Delaware Valley due to the groups’ refusal to place children with same-sex couples for religious reasons.
Although Bethany eventually changed its policy, foster parents and others who worked with CSS filed a lawsuit against city officials, arguing that it violates the U.S. Constitution.
Plaintiff Sharronell Fulton fostered as many as 40 kids during her 25 years of working with CSS. Fellow plaintiff Toni Simms-Busch is a former social worker who adopted her foster children through CSS.
Both were represented by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. Becket argued that CSS was the “most successful” foster care agency in the city and that the city ended its partnership with the organization at a time that city officials admitted an urgent need for foster families with thousands of kids in the system.
“I am overjoyed that the Supreme Court recognized the import work of Catholic Social Services and has allowed me to continue fostering children most in need of a loving home,” Fulton said in a statement. “My faith is what drives me to care for foster children here in Philadelphia and I thank God the Supreme Court believes that’s a good thing, worthy of protection.”
Simms-Busch stressed that the justices "understand that foster parents like me share in the common, noble task of providing children with loving homes."
“Our foster-care ministry in Philadelphia is vital to solving the foster care crisis and Catholic Social Services is a cornerstone of that ministry," Simms-Busch stated. "The Supreme Court’s decision ensures the most vulnerable children in the City of Brotherly Love have every opportunity to find loving homes.”
The Supreme Court decision follows the ruling of a three-judge panel of the Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in favor of the city in April 2019. The panel concluded that the First Amendment “does not prohibit government regulation of religiously motivated conduct so long as that regulation is not a veiled attempt to suppress disfavored religious beliefs.”
Judge slaps down Trudeau government for denying summer jobs grants
to Christian university
Redeemer University met all the conditions for funding but were rejected anyway after a 'cursory search of the Internet' by a Service Canada bureaucrat, ruled a judge
Author of the article:Tristin Hopper
Publishing date:Jul 04, 2021
Redeemer University College pictured in 2011. PHOTO BY PETER J. THOMPSON/NATIONAL POST
In an unusually harsh judicial slapdown of the Trudeau government, a federal judge has ruled that an Ontario university was barred access to the Canada Summer Jobs Program for little reason other than the fact that it was a Christian institution.
Justice Richard Mosley ruled that the federal government had breached “procedural fairness” in its treatment of Redeemer University, a private Christian liberal arts university in Hamilton, Ont. – and had denied the school funding based solely on its religious opposition to same-sex marriage. In a rare move, Mosley also ordered the federal government to pay Redeemer’s full legal costs, which amounted to $102,000.
“I have never seen that in any court, let alone the federal court,” Redeemer University’s lawyer, Albertos Polizogopoulos, told the National Post on Friday, calling the judge’s decision an obvious “punitive” measure.
Redeemer University College v. Canada by Tristin Hopper on Scribd
In 2019, Redeemer University applied for $104,187 from the Canada Summer Jobs Program in order to subsidize 11 temporary positions at the school. At the time, Redeemer had been participating in the Canada Summer Jobs Program since 2006 without incident.
Within two months, the application was rejected on the grounds that Redeemer could not demonstrate “that measures have been implemented to provide a workplace free of harassment and discrimination.”
At the time of the application, Redeemer University required its students to avoid “sexual intimacies which occur outside of a heterosexual marriage” – a policy that also informed the selection of faculty and staff.
An excerpt from Redeemer University’s 2012/2013 Academic Calendar, a version of which was cited in Service Canada’s rejection of the school’s application for Canada Summer Jobs funding.
Nevertheless, those strictures didn’t extend to the school’s 11 Canada Summer Jobs Program positions, which ranged from summer camp attendants to workers at an onsite water treatment plant. In its application Redeemer had even expressly pledged to target “LGBTQ2 youth” for hiring.
Soon after its application, Service Canada asked Redeemer to provide “missing information” as to how the school intended to maintain a non-discriminatory work environment.
In reply, Redeemer forwarded its 35-page Anti-Discrimination Policy which cited the school’s adherence to the Ontario Human Rights Code and cited Redeemer’s campus policy of the right to be “free from the threat of harassment and discrimination.”
Service Canada then rejected the school’s application, citing Redeemer’s “sexual intimacies” policy, as well as academic handbooks published by the school which listed “homosexual practice” as one of the school’s “unacceptable practices” for students and faculty.
Redeemer University College pictured in 2011. PHOTO BY PETER J. THOMPSON/NATIONAL POST
Tuesday’s Federal Court decision effectively concluded that Redeemer University hadn’t been rejected out of any red flags in its application, but because of a “cursory search of the Internet” to which Redeemer hadn’t been given the chance to respond.
“If the concern of (Service Canada) was that Redeemer discriminated based on sexual orientation, there was no contemporaneous evidence of that in the file,” wrote the Federal Court decision.
Justice Mosley added “there is no evidence … that (Service Canada) made any overt attempt to consider Redeemer’s rights to freedom of religion, freedom of expression or freedom of association in considering its application.”
Or, as Redeemer University lawyer Albertos Polizogopoulos summed up the government’s stance, “we don’t like your position on sexual morality and that’s why you’re denied.” In Polizogopoulos’ submissions to the court, he alleged that Redeemer had been subjected to a “background check” beyond the usual scope of the Canada Summer Jobs Program application proceed.
There is no place for sexual morality in Canada's federal Liberal party!
new guidelines were placed on the Canada Summer Jobs Program requiring organizations to support abortion rights.
She later became Minister of Health during the COVID-19 crisis. PHOTO BY REUTERS/BLAIR GABLE
In a statement to the National Post, Redeemer University said it pursued its court action against the federal government because the school felt it “was being rejected only because Redeemer held legal views on traditional marriage.”
Interim president David Zietsma referenced a section of the Civil Marriage Act – the 2005 law which legalized same-sex marriage in Canada – which states that “no person or organization shall be deprived of any benefit” if they held official beliefs viewing marriage “as the union of a man and woman to the exclusion of all others.”
Said Zietsma, “we were concerned about the precedent this kind of discrimination would set for religious institutions.” The lawsuit intentionally did not seek payment of the $104,187 grant, but was pursued instead because of the “principles involved.”
In 2018, the Canada Summer Jobs Program was subject to a wave of lawsuits after employment minister Patty Hajdu made funding conditional on organizations’ pledging their support for abortion.
The federal government ultimately backed off the abortion pledge, and by the time Redeemer University made its 2019 application, Service Canada was instead mandating a much more general policy of a “safe, inclusive, and healthy work environment free of harassment and discrimination.”
Redeemer University applied again for the Canada Summer Jobs Program in both 2020 and 2021. Polizogopoulos said that Service Canada delayed the school’s 2020 application until the program was out of money, but then approved its 2021 application without incident. As a result, this summer Redeemer University hired its first Canada Summer Jobs Program workers since 2017.
Said Polizogopoulos, “I don’t know what changed other than we held the government’s feet to the fire.”
Glad somebody is, the national media most certainly is not!
Judge rejects churches’ challenge to Virginia’s
LGBT antidiscrimination law
By Michael Gryboski,
Christian Post Reporter|
Thursday, July 22, 2021
| Reuters/Annika Af Klercker/TT News Agency
A judge has ruled against a group of churches, schools and a pro-life pregnancy center challenging a Virginia law that adds sexual orientation and gender identity to state antidiscrimination law.
Judge James E. Plowman Jr. issued a ruling from the bench last week in favor of the Virginia Values Act, which was passed by the Democrat-controlled state government in 2020.
Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring released a statement last Friday expressing support for the ruling, which will be entered as an order within the next few weeks.
“Our landmark civil rights protections will remain in place, and Virginia will remain a place that is open and welcoming to all, no matter what you look like, where you come from, how you worship, or who you love,” stated Herring.
Except for anyone who actually believes in the God of the Bible.
“I was proud to support passage of the Virginia Values Act and am so proud of our work to successfully defend the law twice against legal attack.”
God hates pride!
In late September of last year, Alliance Defending Freedom filed a lawsuit on behalf of two churches, three private schools, and a pregnancy care center against the Virginia Values Act.
In the suit, Calvary Road Baptist Church of Fairfax County and its school, Community Fellowship Church of Staunton and its school, Community Christian Academy of Charlottesville, and Care Net of Loudon County claimed that the new law forced them to compromise various hiring and employment practices based on their sincere religious beliefs.
“[The Act] puts the Ministries in an impossible position: they must either abandon the religious convictions they were founded upon, or be ready to face investigations, an onerous administrative process, fines up to $100,000 for each violation, unlimited compensatory and punitive damages and attorney-fee awards, and court orders forcing them to engage in actions that would violate their consciences,” stated the suit, in part.
“Even merely posting their religious beliefs on their own websites could subject the Ministries to prosecution and exorbitant fines. These penalties could easily exceed a million dollars, ruin the Ministries financially, and make continuing their Christian missions impossible.”
In March, U.S. District Court Judge Claude M. Hilton rejected a separate challenge to the Virginia Values Act, another lawsuit filed by the ADF, this time on behalf of Robert Updegrove of Bob Updegrove Photography.
In his decision, Hilton argued that the Updegrove lacked the standing to sue since the Act “has never been enforced against” him “or any other person.”
“In the almost nine months since the statute became effective, no complaint has been filed under the statute,” wrote Hilton in late March.
It won't be long now!
“No case or controversy exists when a person expresses a desire to change his previously compliant conduct to violate a new statute that no person, government or otherwise, has ever sought to enforce.”
So, you have to wait until the circumstances are such that your ministry will be destroyed before you can sue. Good system.
English church vandalised just days after reopening, with windows
smashed & premises covered with bleach, fire extinguisher powder
31 Jul, 2021 11:14
A church in Caldecote, Hertfordshire was heavily vandalised in an attack which saw its windows and decorations smashed – a mere ten days after it reopened following nine months of repairs.
The 14th and 15th century Church of St. Mary Magdalene, which is Grade II-listed and maintained by the Friends of Friendless Churches charity, had its windows smashed, its decorations destroyed, and its furniture, floors and altar covered in fire extinguishing powder and bleach on Thursday afternoon.
The Friends of Friendless Churches published photos of the destruction on social media, noting that though “it may not look like much,” the fire extinguishing powder “is everywhere” and “in every crevice.”
“It's thick. Hours of cleaning and barely any difference made,” the charity declared. “The vandals were very obviously disturbed. It could have been so much worse, but this is so disheartening. Why? Why do something like this?”
In its own statement, the Church of St. Mary Magdalene condemned the “mindless act of vandalism,” and claimed that the police “are treating the crime very seriously.”
Due to the police investigation and clean-up efforts, the church announced that it would “remain closed until further notice” until it can be “safely re-opened.”
Several cases of vandalism against churches have been recorded in the UK during the coronavirus pandemic. In April, historic stained glass windows at a church in Lincolnshire were damaged after vandals appeared to use them for “target practice,” while, in October last year, a man was filmed trying to pull a large crucifix off a church roof in London.
This summer, Canada has also experienced a surge in arson attacks against churches, with at least 57 churches set on fire or otherwise vandalised. The attacks started after the discovery in May of unmarked graves near an old Catholic school for indigenous Canadians.
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