The Texas Senate has passed a bill that protects state-funded foster care and adoption agencies that want to make decisions about child care and child placement based on “sincerely held religious beliefs.”
House Bill 3859, which passed the state Senate on Monday, would protect religious-based child-welfare providers that choose to turn away same-sex couples or families with certain religious views.
Robertson said that putting personal religious beliefs ahead of the best interests of children means the state is taking away a primary layer of protection for children. “The state needs to have the ability to always put the best interest of the child first, and this bill undermines that protection,” she said.
Most agree that Texas’s child welfare system is overloaded, with more than 16,000 children in state foster care, according to the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. Earlier this month, Texas state Rep. James Frank (R-Wichita Falls), the author of the bill, said that Texas is struggling to find quality foster homes in part because religious organizations fear their positions on sensitive issues could lead them into trouble.
“A substantial part of any answer to this problem will be found in the faith-based community,” Frank said in a statement. “Unfortunately, the ability of many of the faith-based institutions to continue offering services is threatened by the prospect of litigation for declining to provide certain services (such as abortion) because of sincerely held religious beliefs.”
Frank said House Bill 3859 protects faith-based foster care and adoption agencies while also requiring the Department of Family and Protective Services to make sure that there are alternative providers ready to assist anyone who is denied services on religious grounds. Presented as protecting religious beliefs, the bill also specifies that agencies cannot discriminate based on race, ethnicity or national origin.
