The Archdiocese of Washington recently ended its 80-year-old foster care and adoption services in that city because of a new same-sex marriage law – making it at least the second Catholic Charities agency to make such a move.
Last month, Catholic Charities transferred the foster care program that it runs under a city contract to the National Center for Children and Families. The program served about 40 children at the time.
The agency said it could not comply with a new city law that, among other things, would require it to provide benefits to the same-sex spouses of employees who get married under the law. Doing so, the organization said, would force it to violate Catholic doctrine against homosexual activity.
Catholic foster care and adoption programs were shut down in Boston in 2006 because of a law that would have required it to place children with gay couples. That move came after The Boston Globe revealed that the agency had placed some children with homosexual couples.
The Washington Post reported on the development in Washington here.
