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Foster Agency Rejects Christians over Values

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Vermont is reportedly discriminating against Christians, preventing those who deny the tenets of transgenderism from fostering children.

From CBN. Two Vermont Christian couples have filed a lawsuit against the state’s Department for Children and Families (DCF) after the agency allegedly revoked their foster licenses for adhering to their Biblical beliefs and refusing to embrace transgender ideology.

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The Alliance Defending Freedom, a non-profit legal group, is representing Brian and Kaitlyn Wuoti and Michael and Rebecca Gantt who have claimed the Vermont DCF mandated “its ideological position at the expense of children.”

“Vermont’s foster-care system is in crisis: There aren’t enough families to care for vulnerable kids, and children born with drug dependencies have nowhere to call home. Yet Vermont is putting its ideological agenda ahead of the needs of these suffering kids,” said ADF Legal Counsel Johannes Widmalm-Delphonse. …

Michael Bryan Gantt is the lead pastor of Agape Christian Fellowship in Battleboro, VT. He and his wife, Rebecca, have adopted three infants from the state in addition to their four biological children. …

Last September, the child-welfare agency reached out to the couple asking them if they would be interested in adopting a boy who was going to be born to a homeless drug addict. …

However, before they could accept the child into the home the agency let them know that they must accept the state’s view on gender ideology, “even if the foster parents hold divergent personal opinions or beliefs,” according to the lawsuit. …

Meanwhile, Brian Wuoti, lead pastor of Valley Town Church in Wilmington, VT, and his wife, Katy, who had become licensed with the Vermont DCF in 2015 and adopted two children through the agency, received a “Notice of Decision” in April 2022 recommending that their license be terminated.

The couple said they could not agree with the department’s policy demanding that parents “support children’s identities even if it feels uncomfortable.”

“In essence, the policy requires foster parents to agree to lie to children and tell them that they can change their sex,” the ADF explained in a statement.

The ADF said in the lawsuit that DCF’s policy not only hinders a child’s chance of finding a forever home but also violates foster parents’ First Amendment rights. …

The Wuoti and Gantt families are asking a federal court to decide whether the state’s policy and its enforcement is unconstitutional and request that it be revoked so that it does not hinder children from being placed with foster parents who don’t agree with the policy. …

Share your prayers and scriptures for these couples in their legal fight below.

(Excerpt from CBN. Photo Credit: Mercedes Mehling on Unsplash)

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