Illinois Catholic Charities Threatens To Turn Away Gay Couples

Like many of the gay hating religious denominations and their affiliated agencies, Illinois Catholic Charities wants to suck in $30 million in taxpayer funds to run its adoption and foster care programs but wants the special right to turn away those that they deem sinful. I'm sorry, but the minute organizations like Illinois Catholic Charities accept the first dollar of taxpayer derived funds, they forfeit their right to make religious based judgments against others. I hope the state of Illinois hangs tough and tells Illinois Catholic Charities to either cease in religious based discrimination or lose 100% of public funds. Yes, it might cause short term disruptions in services, but it is far past time that religious organizations be allowed to have their cake and eat it too. Oh, and while the state is at it, how about some criminal prosecutions of priests and bishops for the obstruction of justice flowing from the sex abuse cover up conspiracy. Here are high lights from Huffington Post on the blackmail efforts of Illinois Catholic Charities:
*
One of the largest adoption agencies in Illinois is threatening to turn away couples with civil unions, despite state law demanding they do otherwise.
*
Catholic Charities has more than 3,000 children in its foster care and adoption agencies, representing around 20 percent of all such services in the state, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. In recompense, the state pays the organization around $30 million a year.
*
But when the state's new civil unions law goes into effect on June 1, heads of those agencies are saying that they do not plan to serve gay couples in those unions.
*
"The Catholic Church is not going to be OK with Catholic Charities processing applications from anyone in a civil union," Trish Fox, the head of the Catholic Charities of Peoria, told Chicago Public Radio. "And all we're asking is that we can continue what we've always done, which is refer cohabitating couples, heterosexual or homosexual, to another agency."
*
The language of the civil unions law, though, is clear on the subject: if an agency receives state dollars, it cannot discriminate against same-sex couples -- that is, it must treat people in civil unions as it would treat married couples.
*
Anthony Martinez, Executive Director of The Civil Rights Agenda, said in a press release that it's as simple as that. “If an organization receives state funding, they must serve all residents of that state equally," Martinez said. "I don’t want my tax dollars to fund discrimination in any form, and that is exactly what the Catholic Charities are asking for: the right to discriminate.”