A couple in Tennessee are suing the state government after a religious adoption agency allegedly refused to help them because they were Jewish.
The lawsuit, filed by Elizabeth and Gabriel Rutan-Ram in the Chancery Court of Davis County, Tennessee, on Wednesday, names the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services as the defendant and is attempting to challenge a law that allows religious adoption agencies to deny service to whoever agencies believe violates their “religious or moral convictions.”
“The Tennessee Constitution, like the U.S. Constitution, promises religious freedom and equality for everyone. Tennessee is reneging on that promise by allowing a taxpayer-funded agency to discriminate against Liz and Gabe Rutan-Ram because they are Jews,” said Alex J. Luchenitser, associate vice president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Rutan-Rams.
The Rutan-Rams wanted to adopt a child from Florida in early 2021, according to a press release. However, Tennessee requires that adoptive couples complete mandated foster parent training and a home-study certification. The decision to adopt a child from outside Tennessee meant that they were limited in agency options for training. So they approached Holston United Methodist Home for Children, a religious adoption agency and the only one that would account for the Rutan-Rams’ adoption desires.
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The Rutan-Rams claim that Holston initially told them that the agency would provide for their needs. On the day that they were to start training, Holston denied the couple access, saying that it would “only provide adoption services to prospective adoptive families that share our [Christian] belief system.” Because no other agencies were willing to provide the training and certification required, the Rutan-Rams could not adopt their child, Americans United for Separation of Church and State said.
“Everything Holston Home does is guided by our religious views. We seek to be a force for good, living out the words of Christ to care for children and ‘the least of these,’ and it is vital that Holston Home, as a religious organization, remains free to continue placing at-risk children in loving, Christian families, according to our deeply held beliefs,” the adoption agency’s CEO Bradley Williams told the Washington Examiner.
When asked about the truthfulness of the Rutan-Rams’ testimony or the details of the lawsuit, Williams declined to comment.
The Rutan-Rams’ lawsuit is the first filed in an attempt to challenge a 2020 law that “prohibits a private licensed child-placing agency from being required to perform, assist, consent to, refer, or participate in any child placement for foster care or adoption that would violate the agency’s written religious or moral convictions.”
The law drew ire from activists, who declared the bill to be “anti-gay.”
The lawsuit claimed the law in question violates Article I of the Tennessee Constitution, which “guarantees freedom of worship and separation of church and state.” The lawsuit also claimed that the adoption law deprived the Rutan-Rams of their religious rights and ability to adopt a child.
The lawsuit requested that the court declare the adoption law a violation of the Tennessee Constitution and asked that it stop state funding to Holston for as long as it continues to discriminate.
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A representative from the Department of Children’s Services told the Washington Examiner that it is “unable to comment on pending litigation.”
