A [UK] court ruling has found that Christians who want to provide foster care for needy children must promote homosexuality to them and that there is only a "qualified" right to exercise their Christian beliefs.
In a related story: Judge Says Judeo-Christian Values Are Obsolete
UPDATE 3/10/11: Courts have 'special animosity' for Christians
-- From "Anti-gay couple lose foster care case in U.K." by Alex Sundby, CBS News 3/1/11
A ruling from Britain's high court found that a Pentecostal Christian couple's belief that homosexuality is morally wrong could be used as a factor in deciding whether they can care for foster children.
Eunice and Owen Johns, aged 62 and 65 respectively, couldn't convince judges at London's Royal Courts of Justice that a British city discriminated against them after they expressed their views on homosexuality, the Guardian newspaper of London reported Monday.
The case stems from the Johns telling a Derby city social worker in 2007 that they couldn't tell a child that a "homosexual lifestyle" was acceptable, the Guardian reported. The couple had cared for foster children in the past and wanted to take in children aged 5 to 10.
In their ruling, Lord Justice Munby and Justice Beatson noted they weren't striking down the Johns' beliefs but ruled instead on the discrimination stemming from those beliefs, the Guardian reported.
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From "'Our Christianity is our lifestyle – we can’t take it on and off’" by Cassandra Jardine, London Telegraph 3/1/11
. . . Eunice lives according to the instruction she finds in the Bible – and one of those instructions is that sex should be confined to marriage. For that reason, she and her equally beaming, gentle husband, Owen, have not been allowed to foster children.
The sticking point was their answer to the question: “Would you tell a child it was OK to be homosexual?” The Johns replied that they would not. They would love a child regardless, but not endorse that lifestyle.
The problem? Their views, they learnt, had disbarred them from caring for other people’s children under the 2007 Equalities and Sexual Orientation regulations. As interpreted by Derbyshire social workers, and now the law courts, this means that they have to endorse homosexuality. “I worked with homosexuals as a nurse and it was never a problem,” says Eunice. “The issue never arose with any of the children who came to stay with us. If it were to, I would ask social services for a professional to deal with it.”
She might have done better to fudge the issue when asked a direct question. “But,” she protests, “our Christianity isn’t something we can just take on and off. It is our lifestyle.” Her husband adds that this ruling represents “the first stage of persecution”.
In the courtroom battle, Christianity has lost to equality rights.
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From "People have only 'qualified' right to Christianity" by Bob Unruh © 2011 WorldNetDaily 3/1/11
According to the Christian Legal Centre . . . "There now appears to be nothing to stop the increasing bar on Christians who wish to adopt or foster children but who are not willing to compromise their beliefs by promoting the practice of homosexuality to small children."
The judges, however, said it was the couples' view on homosexuality, not their biblically based beliefs about homosexuality, that created the problem. And the judges went further, declaring that Christianity has no role in the concept of justice in the UK.
According to the opinion authored by Lord Justice Munby and Mr. Justice Beatson, "the laws and usages of the realm do not include Christianity, in whatever form." They said, "the aphorism that 'Christianity is part of the common law of England' is mere rhetoric; at least since the decision of the House of Lords in Bowman v Secular Society Limited … it has been impossible to contend that it is law."
"It is important to realize that reliance upon religious belief, however conscientious the belief and however ancient and respectable the religion, can never of itself immunize the believer from the reach of the secular law. And invocation of religious belief does not necessarily provide a defense to what is otherwise a valid claim," they wrote.
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