In an appearance on Meet The Press this weekend, Newt Gingrich reiterated a claim he’s made many times before that Massachusetts’s legalization of marriage equality discriminated against the Catholic Church’s ability to provide adoption services. In this particular appearance, he offered his most exaggerated description of what happened when Catholic Charities in Boston closed its adoption services, claiming that the state “outlawed” Catholic doctrine. MSNBC Joy-Ann Reid offered counterpoint:

GINGRICH: What I’m struck with is the one-sidedness of the desire for rights. There are no rights for Catholics to have adoption services in Massachusetts. They’re outlawed. There are no rights in DC for Catholics to have adoption service. They’re outlawed. This passing reference to religion, we sort of respect religion, sure — as long as you don’t practice it. I mean I think it would be good to have a debate over, you know — beyond this question of, “Are you able to be gay in America?”What does it mean?

Does it mean that you have to actually affirmatively eliminate any institution which does not automatically accept that, and therefore, you’re now going to have a secular state say to a wide range of religious groups — Catholics, Protestants, orthodox Jews, Mormons, frankly, Muslims — “You cannot practice your religion the way you believe it, and we will outlaw your institutions.” … Let’s just start with adoption services. It is impossible for the Catholic Church to have an adoption service in Massachusetts that follows Catholic doctrine.

REID: But didn’t the Catholic Church, particularly Catholic Charities in Boston — they affirmatively decided to withdraw adoption services. No one said they are not allowed to provide adoption services.

GINGRICH: No, they withdrew them because they were told, “You could not follow Catholic doctrine,” which is for marriage between a man and a woman.

Watch it:

Gingrich always leaves out two details when he weaves this tale. First of all, Massachusetts has had a law prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation since 1989, well before the 2004 decision by the state Supreme Court allowing recognition of same-sex couples’ marriages. As reported by the Boston Globe, over the course of about two decades until 2005, Catholic Charities facilitated 720 adoptions, 13 of which were actually to same-sex couples — without complaint.

Secondly, Catholic Charities accepted state funding to provide its adoption services, requiring it to continue complying with that nondiscrimination law. It was only in 2006 that four bishops decided of their own accord that Catholic Charities should be exempt from that requirement, a proposal for which they received minimal support from state lawmakers. Even though the agency’s 42-member board unanimously agreed to continue facilitating adoptions by same-sex couples, the bishops arbitrarily shut the entire operation down in protest of the law. It had nothing to do with the legality of same-sex marriage, especially because that was decided by the state Supreme Court and thus reflected no change in the laws regulating adoption services. Arguably, it was only the increase in visibility of same-sex families that may have prompted the bishops to respond.

This has been the case in other places where Catholic Charities has claimed to face conflict with marriage equality, including the District of Columbia and Illinois; the organizations only shut down for political purposes, not because any laws required them to do so. Most notably, when Colorado was considering civil unions in 2012, the bill had a specific protection to allow Catholic Charities to continue discriminating against same-sex couples, but the agency still threatened to shut down in protest of the law. The bill that ultimately passed this year did not include those protections, but that didn’t stop the organization from attempting to derail it.

Gingrich’s claim that marriage equality somehow impedes the religious freedom of Catholics is completely unfounded. In all of these states, Catholic Charities could continue to operate, but if it wants to continue receiving state funding, it has to comply with state laws. No chapter has yet attempted to continue functioning without state subsidies.

The Colorado House Finance Committee met today to hear the legislation for civil unions. It passed 7-6 along party lines, with all six Republicans on the committee voting against it. Once again, Republicans attempted to add an amendment that would allow Catholic Charities to discriminate against same-sex couples in its adoption services, even implying that it functions as a government entity, but the amendment failed. Last year, Catholic Charities testified that it would shut down whether it had exemptions or not. The bill advances to one more committee later this week — House Appropriations — before it can proceed to the House floor for a vote.

With a Democratic majority now in both chambers of Colorado’s legislature, civil unions legislation is expected to pass quite easily this year. That won’t stop Catholic Charities from attempting to thwart the effort with its perennial threat to abandon all adoption services if not granted specific protections to continue discriminating against same-sex couples. Mark Rohlena, President and CEO of Catholic Charities of Central Colorado, explains that a complete shutdown is “very well what could happen”:

ROHLENA: We feel it would be a very sad commentary if Colorado forced religious institutions or those who believe in a different framework to do something against their conscience… We probably would cease the operation of our adoption programs. That risk is always there. I think that we would try to explore every avenue available to us to provide this vital service to the community.

Catholic Charities can easily avoid the conflict by functioning privately without dependency on state funding. Catholic Charities in Illinois, Massachusetts, and Washington, DC preferred to honor their ultimatums and voluntarily shut down when the respective governments refused to continue the organization’s funding if it discriminated. Rohlena claimed that his agency does not receive state funds to “any significant degree,” so this shouldn’t be a concern.

But Catholic Charities demonstrated quite brashly during the debate last year in Colorado that it cares more about opposing recognition of same-sex couples than it does the service it provides. Last year’s version of the civil unions bill included a specific provision that the law could “not be interpreted to require a child placement agency to place a child for adoption with parties to a civil union.” Despite this exemption, Catholic Charities nonetheless testified it would shut down anyway.

If any lawmaker might be swayed by Catholic Charities, that testimony should be sufficient evidence that the threat is a bluff. Just as an Illinois bishop recently admitted that religious exemptions will not assuage the Catholic Church’s opposition to marriage equality, Catholic Charities of Colorado is going to protest civil unions even if lawmakers meet all of their demands.

Michigan state Rep. Kenneth Kurtz (R), sponsor of the 'licence to discriminate' bills.

Last week, a Michigan Senate committee advanced a bill that would allow healthcare providers to discriminate against individuals or object to providing any services if it violated their conscience. Now, a Michigan House committee has advanced two bills that provide a similar “license to discriminate” for adoption agencies. Introduced by Rep. Kenneth Kurtz (R), HB 5763 and HB 5764 allow any child placement agency to discriminate based on “religious or moral convictions” without fear of financial retribution from the state:

A child placing agency is not required to perform, assist, counsel, recommend, facilitate, refer, or participate in a placement that violates the child placing agency’s written or moral convictions or policies. A state or local government entity may not deny a child placing agency a grant, contract, or participation in a government program because of the child placing agency’s objection to performing, assisting, counseling, recommending, facilitating, referring, or participating in a placement that violates the child placing agency’s written or moral convictions or policies.

If the blatant invitation to use state funding to discriminate against Michigan families weren’t odious enough, the bills even acknowledge that the policy has nothing to do with what’s best for the children involved:

Refusal by a child placing agency to perform, assist, counsel, recommend, facilitate, refer, or participate in a placement that violates the child placing agency’s written or moral convictions or policies does not constitute a determination that the proposed adoption is not in the best interests of the adoptee.

Equality Michigan notes that Michigan has 14,000 children in foster care, including 5,000 whose biological parents’ rights have been terminated. These young people could find safe, loving families with same-sex couples, but not if the state’s agencies are free to discriminate for no legitimate purpose other than bigoted beliefs or unfounded stereotypes about the legitimacy of such families. Taxpayer money should not be spent according to the whims of Catholic Charities or other discriminatory agencies.

Conservatives often claim that it’s LGBT activists who are putting their “adult” needs over those of children, but this legislation shows that it’s those who oppose equality who care the least about the fate of children.

The Maryland Catholic Conference has objected to the official language released this week for Question 6, the marriage equality referendum on the Maryland ballot. According to the MCC, the language is “misguided” for suggesting that religious liberty will be protected:

Proponents of the law claim the ballot language reflects the measure’s supposed religious freedom protections for those who believe marriage is the union of one man and one woman. This claim is misguided and ignores the fundamental reason to reject this measure. [...] According to the actual legislation, religious organizations that accept any sort of state or federal funds are excluded from religious liberty protections. They are not exempt, and there are no protections for individuals. Marylanders should not be fooled into thinking we can redefine marriage and still protect religious liberty.

What the MCC is suggesting is that “religious liberty” should enable any individual or business to ignore the legal recognition of same-sex marriages if they so choose, even if they operate under the purview of public law. In states like Illinois and Massachusetts and the District of Columbia, Catholic Charities voluntarily shut itself down, ignoring the viable options of either recognizing same-sex couples or operating without state funding. The Catholic Church is arguing that religious beliefs should grant permission to completely ignore the laws set forth by the government — in other words, anarchy.

(Source: SlapUpsideTheHead.com)

Focus on the Family and the Alliance Defense Fund are apparently organizing to again pursue a constitutional amendment in Colorado that would give religious groups free reign to discriminate against LGBT people and control what kind of health benefits women have access to. The so-called “Religious Freedom Amendment” asserts that a “sincerely held religious belief” cannot be “burdened” by the government:

(1) The right to act or refuse to act in a manner motivated by a sincerely held religious belief may not be burdened unless the government proves it has a compelling governmental interest in infringing the specific act or refusal to act and has used the least restrictive means to further that interest.

(2) A burden includes indirect burdens such a [sic] as withholding of one or more benefits, assessing one or more penalties, exclusion from one of [sic] more government programs, and/or exclusion from one or more government facility [sic].

Aside from the offense of writing numerous typos into the Colorado constitution, the amendment not-so-subtly demands that religious groups have more power over citizens than the government by essentially giving them veto power over all policy decisions. This language could easily be construed such that the government would be permanently tethered to subsidizing religious groups, no matter how exclusive the policies of that group would be.

For example, after civil unions legislation passed in Illinois last year, the state decided to stop subsidizing Catholic Charities’ adoption services with taxpayer funding because the agencies refused to serve same-sex couples. Were this amendment to pass in Colorado, the state could never back out of such funding if organizations claimed their discrimination was based on a “sincerely held religious belief.” (Incidentally, even though Colorado’s proposed civil unions law actually would create a religious exception, Catholic Charities announced they would nevertheless shut down all services if the bill passes.)

One Colorado, the state’s LGBT advocacy organization, has put out a call to action to oppose the amendment, highlighting its many consequences for all Coloradans:

Imagine a law that allows a pharmacist to refuse to fill a birth control prescription. A law that permits an employer to refuse to hire people on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity and expression. A law that gives protection to teachers who refuse to teach sex education or evolution. All for the sake of so-called religious freedom.

Conservatives failed to place a similar amendment on the ballot in 2010. Ideally, this proposal will meet the same fate.