Major Evangelical Adoption Agency Will Now Serve Gay Parents
The New York Times’ Ruth Graham reports, “One of the country’s largest adoption and foster care agencies, Bethany Christian Services, announced Monday that it will begin providing services to L.G.B.T.Q. parents nationwide effective immediately.” While there was no official policy to avoid same-sex couples, a board member said, “It was a general understanding that was pervasive.” The organization eliminated a 2007 position statement that defined marriage as between a man and a woman, but they stopped short of endorsing gay marriage. Graham writes, “Bethany’s new approach is something of a tightrope act: an attempt to establish a clear, consistent policy of inclusion that does not rattle its core constituencies.”