Christian foster-care agency seeks Trump administration approval to reject Jewish, Muslim families
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is considering a request that would allow a Christian foster-care agency in South Carolina to deny Jewish, Muslim, atheist, or agnostic parents the right to take in kids.
According to a lengthy report from the Intercept, Greenville-based Miracle Hill Ministries, which says on its website that it “has made it our mission to find Christian foster parents,” is asking HHS to waive its requirement to comply with federal nondiscrimination laws so it can continue to exclusively serve Christian families. Without the exception, Miracle Hill, which receives federal funds, may lose its license due to pressure from the state’s Department of Social Services (DSS).
As The Nation reported in June, Republican South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (reportedly a friend of President Trump) is supporting the request, claiming that forcing Miracle Hill to comply with nondiscrimination laws violates its constitutional rights and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which states, “Government shall not substantially burden a person’s free exercise of religion.” The act was passed in 1993; however, in 1997, the Supreme Court ruled that it would only apply to federal law, not state law. Since then, various states have interpreted the law differently.
South Carolina families have the option of working with other child placement agencies — and Miracle Hill says it will refer non-Christian families elsewhere. However, per its website, it’s “the largest and most comprehensive provider of shelter and food to homeless children and adults in Upstate South Carolina,” and thus is in high demand.
Jewish mom Beth Lesser, who along with her husband fostered children for a decade in Florida before moving to South Carolina, told the Intercept that she was rejected by Miracle Hill. “Understand, in the upstate of South Carolina, if you want to be a foster parent or a mentor, there’s DSS, which is the government. And there’s Miracle Hill. There really isn’t anybody else,” she said.
In fact, she alleges, a representative of Miracle Hill stated that she wasn’t even allowed to serve as a mentor through the organization. “I’ve never felt that sort of discrimination before,” she told the Intercept. “Once they get [the children] in one of their group homes, they don’t let non-Christian Protestants mentor them, foster them, or anything.”
Lesser added, “What Miracle Hill does is they scoop up these kids from foster care, and they have these group homes. And then once they get the kids in there, their whole objective is to indoctrinate them into their brand of Christianity.”
Earlier this year, South Carolina’s Department of Social Services (DSS) wrote in a letter obtained by the Intercept that Miracle Hill was violating state and federal nondiscrimination laws by requiring foster parents to be Protestant.
DSS gave Miracle Hill 60 days to enact new rules and refused to issue a new, permanent state license to the organization unless it becomes more inclusive, reports the Intercept. “We found that a little weird because we’ve been doing this for 29 years and no one has ever raised the issue with us before,” Reid Lehman, the president and CEO of Miracle Hill, told Greenville News in March. “No one has ever suggested that we couldn’t recruit Christian foster families.”
In response, Miracle Hill retaliated by persuading state officials to appeal to the White House.
Representatives of Miracle Hill Ministries, South Carolina Department of Social Services, and the American Civil Liberties Union of South Carolina did not respond to Yahoo Lifestyle’s requests for comment.
In May, according to USA Today, Trump signed an executive order stating that federally funded faith-based organizations won’t have to refer individuals to other programs if they take issue with those programs’ religious beliefs. “As president, I will always protect religious liberty,” Trump said, according to the outlet. “Faith is more powerful than government, and nothing is more powerful than God.”
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