Indiana has approved new legislation designed to protect faith-based foster care and adoption providers, as similar disputes in other states have led to families losing or being denied licenses over their religious views on gender and sexuality.
Republican Gov. Mike Braun signed House Bill 1389 into law on Thursday after it cleared the Indiana Senate in a 44-0 bipartisan vote and passed the Indiana House of Representatives 84-12.
The statute bars state and local government agencies from penalizing “a person that provides, or declines to provide, an adoption or foster care service in a manner consistent with the person’s sincerely held religious belief.” It also safeguards foster and adoptive parents who raise or plan to raise children in alignment with their “sincerely held religious belief.”
At the same time, the law permits state agencies to consider religious compatibility when making placement decisions. Specifically, it allows officials to prioritize placing children with families who share the child’s faith or the faith of the biological parents. The measure contains a right of action against government entities for anyone who feels their rights under the new law were violated.
Chafuen said the measure will allow Indiana children to benefit from “as many adoption and foster care agencies as possible,” whether they are faith-based or secular.
The governor’s action comes amid ongoing controversies in other states where foster families have lost or been denied certification for declining to affirm LGBT ideology because of their religious convictions.
In 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Philadelphia could not exclude a Catholic foster care agency from participating in the city’s foster program due to its policy of not placing children with same-sex couples.
More recently, in 2023, Massachusetts residents Michael and Catherine Burke sued state officials after their application to become foster parents was rejected because they “would not be affirming to a child who identified as LGBTQIA” based on their beliefs about gender and sexuality. Their lawsuit remains pending more than two years later.
Vermont also faced multiple lawsuits from foster parents whose licenses were revoked over their religious beliefs. That litigation concluded last month when the state agreed to adopt revised guidance clarifying that “[a]pplicants’ sincerely held personal, cultural, religious, moral, or philosophical beliefs shall not be considered in the licensing process.”
