Christian Foster Parents

[Theland]

Yesterdays news - A Christian couple are forbidden to foster any more children because they refuse to instruct the 11 year old boy in their care about homosexuality being an acceptable alternative lifestyle, and to take the lad to homosexual discussion groups.
I haven't got a link yet.
I'd like to learn your views on this.
Personally, I think it is terrible and another example of political correctness gone too far.

[Theland]

So many posts here defend the right of homosexuals to be different and live differently from the majority of people. And to think differently, about sex and sexuality.
Yet none of these posters defend the right of this couple to think differently to them.
Where is the tolerance in that?
I rather think that the intolerance is blatant.

[jackthehat]

This couple are perfectly entitled to 'think differently', Theland. It's just that it doesn't stop at 'thinking', does it ? They will tell this child that it is wrong, wrong, wrong because they think it is.........

[ojread2]

Way off the mark

I have not defended the rights of gay people to have the right to live differently, just the right to be who they are
I am definitely defending the Mathericks rights in what they believe

Your intolerance is blatant towards Christianity, are you right and we are wring then? Can't have it both ways

[Theland]

Jack - you are a classic case of, "chip on you shoulder," looking for an insult where none exists or intentionally given.
It seems that in this great big oh so politically correct tolerant society, there is no room for a view that does not match your own.
Some tolerance!

[ojread2]

PC is the reason the Mathericks have had thier foster son taken form them

[naomi24]

As a parent, I would answer a child's questions on any subject as openly and honestly as I could, and if a child did display homosexual tendancies, I would help and advise him/her to the best of my ability, but I would never sign such an agreement. Adults are free to live their lives in their own way - but children should be allowed to be children.

I read a report on this in another newspaper. These people have been fostering children successfully for some considerable time, and this child has not been abandoned - he's been removed from a loving home and is devastated, so is this really in his best interests? What good will it do him? I'm not a Christian, but I'm with Theland on this. It is potty political correctness gone too far.

[Sweep2k]

People might think differently if homosexuals were defined by their negativity towards another social group. But they're not.

And I have to say, not all Christians are either. The more enlightened ones don't have an issue with homosexuality.

And I think the majority of people would welcome a child being fostered by a loving Christian couple.

It's just the hypocrisy and teeth-nashing hatred of many Chistians that cause concern.

Where did this gay-hating come from? It's mentioned in passing in the bible and yet people cling onto it as if it's a central tenet of Christiany - one that supercedes 'Love thy neighbour' for example.

[Theland]

ojread - Your views are highly likely to be congruent with these foster parents.
They stated, they have never discriminated against anybody. That would also go against their beliefs and values.

[paulos66]

Theland do you believe you discriminate against people?

[Sweep2k]

I have to agree with naomi (I think).

The bare facts of the story do suggest an odd amount of interference by the authorities. Do they make all Christian couples agree to this?

I doubt it.

Which is why I suspect there's more to it. The agencies would only react in this way if the foster paretns had demonstrated themselves to be worryingly intolerant. That wouldn't make as good a news story though so probably best to gloss over that bit.

[twaflooers]

Theland can I ask what gives you (or anybody else for that matter) the right to decide what is 'normal' and what is not?

For you repression, bigotry and intolerance is obviously 'normal' however to others (myself included) it may not be.

You just have to look at the stats re single mothers, divorced parents, estranged couples to see that we no longer live in a picture book society where virginal miss meets virginal mr, they fall in love, get married, then have sex, have a baby(ies), daddy goes off to work whilst mummy stays home looking after the child / house and eagerly makes dinner and waits for daddy coming home.

I am glad to say that those cicumstances were not 'normal' for me and whilst I'm not saying they're necessarily wrong they don't apply to everyone.

Are people not entitled to their own normality?

[jackthehat]

Blimey, Theland !
Come and walk a mile in my slippers and you'll see the buckets-full of tolerance I have to bear.........
........and often because of well-intentioned people like yourself and the Mathericks.
You have stated, not just in this thread I hasten to add, that I live an abnormal and aberrant lifestyle................but I'm not to take offence beacause you take your authority from the Big Book of Fairytales and therefore rational thought is entirely out of your hands................

[ojread2]

Not really, I have my own thoughts on this subject as much as the next person - you miss points made and choose those you wish to answer

Why the heck to foster parents have to do things differently from bio parents? Why do they have to discuss things, not just this subject, but everything? Surely the whole notion and idea about fostering is that children grow up in as 'normal' a family environment as possible. Where in life to families who are the 'norm' actively take part in discussions about homosexuals? they don't, they discuss it as and when the subject appears within the family group such as when a child ask the question

[naomi24]

Sweep, or more to the point, do the authorities insist that all foster parents, regardless of religion, agree to this?

[ojread2]

Sweep, there is defintely much more ot this

But then this is the Mail afterall

[Theland]

To answer a few of the posts in one go --
I do not discriminate against anybody, regardless of their own particular makeup.
What they do and what they believe is their business, as long as they do not impose it on anybody else.
That goes also for Christianity, which I believe in. It is not to be imposed, but explained to those who ask.

[twaflooers]

I fail to see how they can claim that they have never desciminated against anybody when they refuse to discuss the notion of homosexuality? Is that not in itself descriminatory?

[Theland]

Taking this to its logical conclusion, a prospective foster couple, who happen to be Christians, would have to stop attending church, as it would be setting a bad example.

What about smokers, drinkers, the obese, the left wing, the right wing, those who are apolitical?
Should the child be exposed to people who do not take their civic duties seriously and refuse to vote?

[WaldoMcFroog]

The regulations in question apply to all foster carers because they are employees of the local authority: the Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003.

[Sweep2k]

Now that's another juicy debate:

Are faith schools morally acceptable?