Labour’s controversial equality laws shouldn’t be used to silence people who disagree with homosexual conduct, a group of senior bishops has warned.
The stark warning came as a Christian couple, Eunice and Owen Johns, appeared in the High Court arguing that their traditional Christian beliefs on sexual ethics had led to them being barred from fostering.
The Johns are seeking clarification on Labour’s Sexual Orientation Regulations and Equality Act to establish if their faith excludes them from fostering.
Morally
The couple are being represented by the Christian Legal Centre (CLC), a group which campaigns for religious liberty.
In a letter supporting the couple, four bishops, including the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey, warned that those morally opposed to homosexual conduct should be free to hold their beliefs.
The bishops cautioned: “A commitment to respecting conscience is the essence of civil liberty.
“The supporters of homosexual rights cannot be allowed to suppress all disagreement or disapproval and ‘coerce silence’.”
Christian
They added: “If the court believes that those with traditional Christian views on homosexuality can be discriminated against, the state has taken a position on a moral question, namely that such religious belief is problematic.”
Mr and Mrs Johns, who have previously fostered 15 children, applied to become respite care foster workers for children aged between five and ten in 2007.
However, the couple agreed to withdraw their application after a social worker raised concerns about their Christian beliefs regarding homosexuality.
Beliefs
Describing the situation Mrs Johns said: “The council said: ‘Do you know, you would have to tell them that it’s OK to be homosexual?'”.
“But I said I couldn’t do that because my Christian beliefs won’t let me. Morally, I couldn’t do that. Spiritually, I couldn’t do that.”
Speaking in Court yesterday Paul Diamond, who is representing the Johns, said: “The promotion of values is something that the court should be protecting”.
Protect
He added: “People have a wide range of views, but the only views that are being singled out for conflict are the views of homosexual people. The Christian viewpoint, if the courts don’t protect it, will be vanquished in this country.”
Andrea Minichello-Williams, director of CLC, said: “Research clearly establishes that children flourish best in a family with both a mother and a father in a committed relationship, like the Johns have.
Sexual ethics
“One of the issues before the Court is whether Christian couples, who have traditional views of sexual ethics, are ‘fit and proper persons’ to foster – and by implication, adopt.”
The Johns’ stance has been criticised by a homosexual campaign group.
Campaign
Ben Summerskill, chief executive of Stonewall, said: “Too often in fostering cases nowadays it’s forgotten that it is the interests of a child, and not the prejudices of a parent, that matter.”
Earlier this year a foster carer with 10 years’ experience was vindicated by the High Court after she was struck off when a Muslim girl in her care converted to Christianity.
The woman, who was supported by The Christian Institute, had been banned from fostering by Gateshead Council in November 2008 for failing to prevent the teenager from getting baptised.
Quashed
The girl was aged 16 at the time and had made up her own mind to change religion.
But in July Gateshead’s decision to deregister the foster carer was quashed by the High Court after the council admitted it had acted unlawfully.
The carer, a churchgoer in her 50s who has fostered more than 45 children, brought a Judicial Review against the Council after she had exhausted every other available remedy.
Her lawyers said the council had failed to take account of the girl’s right to religious liberty and had acted disproportionately in deregistering the foster carer.