A Catholic adoption agency has been told it cannot discriminate against gay couples in the latest outcome of an ongoing legal battle that has pitted the rights of same sex parents against religious groups who want to opt-out of anti-discrimination legislation.

By Jerome Taylor

Catholic Care, which serves the dioceses of Leeds, Middlesbrough, and Hallam in South Yorkshire, is the only Catholic adoption agency still fighting new rules which came in three years ago and forced adoption groups to accept parents regardless of their sexuality. All the other Catholic agencies have either stopped placing children or broken away from their diocese and complied with the anti-discrimination rules. But Catholic Care, which used to find homes for roughly ten children a year, has fought the anti-discrimination legislation in a series of court battles over the past two years. The charity has been trying to obtain an exemption under the Sexual Orientation Regulations to allow it to continue to operate as it had always done, but the attempt was opposed by the Charity Commission.

Source: INDEPENDENT