|
Friend,
Some stories are simply hard to believe. Yet Jessica Bates’s story isn’t fiction.
Jessica is a Christian and a mom of five children. A few years ago, she and her late husband were in a car crash. Her husband died.
After hearing a radio broadcast from Focus on the Family, Jessica knew the Lord was calling her to adopt children in need. She desires to open her home to children, specifically a sibling pair who need a family to call their own.
But the State of Oregon is excluding her from adopting or fostering.
Jessica is asking only for the chance to serve others and access a state program on an equal playing field. This is something the Constitution demands.
But Oregon disagrees.
In fact, the Oregon Department of Human Services rules state that anyone seeking to adopt must set aside their biblical beliefs to promote contrary views on gender and sexuality.
This means parents must agree to tell boys they can be girls and girls they can be boys, take children to events like Pride parades, and facilitate a child’s access to interventions like puberty blockers and hormone shots that block a child’s natural biological development.
But Jessica wants to lovingly care for and accept children in need without contradicting her Christian faith. Oregon says that is not an option. But do the children in Oregon’s system agree?
Oregon is refusing to allow people of faith with religiously informed views on gender and sexuality to adopt or to provide foster care, even if they seek to care for infants and newborns.
It’s a blatant act of religious discrimination. |
