Black Community News News and Commentary for Christians
Jessica Bates, a widowed mother of five and a Christian, wanted to adopt siblings stuck in the foster care system, but the state said she couldn’t. Why?
The Oregon Department of Human Services (ODHS) denied Bates’s application because she refuses to lie to children about sexuality.
In a hypothetical scenario in which a child was “transgender,” Bates said should she wouldn’t go along with the pretense. The state told her she was not eligible to adopt based on her responses. The state discriminated against Bates because of her religious beliefs.
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) represents Bates. An excerpt:
Although Bates told ODHS officials that she would happily love and accept any child placed with her, officials rejected her application, making her ineligible to adopt any child—even infants or children who share her religious beliefs.
ADF filed a lawsuit on Bates’s behalf in 2023. ADF announced that a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ordered ODHS to reconsider Bates’s application to adopt. She will likely succeed on the merits, the court contended.
The court said that no one would think of excluding parents based on their political views or race. So why religious views?
“Adoption is not a constitutional law dead zone,” the court wrote. “And a state’s general conception of the child’s best interest does not create a force field against the valid operation of other constitutional rights.”
Jonathan Scruggs, ADF senior counsel, said that children suffer when the state excludes religious individuals from adopting.
“Because caregivers like Jessica cannot promote Oregon’s dangerous gender ideology to young kids and take them to events like pride parades, the state considers them to be unfit parents. That is false and incredibly dangerous, needlessly depriving kids of opportunities to find a loving home.”
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