A lawsuit was filed on Aug. 8 in a federal court in Boston against Massachusetts state officials, accusing them of denying a married Catholic couple a license to serve as foster parents because of the couple’s religious beliefs concerning marriage, sexuality, and gender.
The religious liberty law firm Becket filed the complaint, Burke v. Walsh, on behalf of Mike and Kitty Burke against officials of the state’s Department of Children and Families (DCF) and also its Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS), which oversees DCF.
DCF denied the couple’s application even though Massachusetts is in dire need of foster parents and has approximately 1,500 children who are in need of a family, the firm said in a statement. The situation is so urgent and acute that sometimes the state houses the children in hospitals.
Disqualified for Religious Beliefs
“Mike and Kitty are a loving couple who want to adopt children,” said Lori Windham, vice president and senior counsel for Becket. “They believe what the Catholic Church teaches about marriage and sex and gender, and that is the reason that they’re not allowed to adopt a child in Massachusetts.
“Let me say this—the rule that Massachusetts applied to them could be used to exclude Catholics and Orthodox Jews and Muslims, and many Protestants, and people of other faith groups. And that would be terrible because Massachusetts is in desperate need of more foster and adoptive families.”
Faith is important to the Burkes, who own a small business. The couple performs music for Mass at their church.
Early in their marriage, the Burkes found out that they could not have biological children of their own. But Mike, an Iraq War veteran, and Kitty, a former school paraprofessional who worked with special needs children, decided to pursue becoming foster parents and started the process in 2022.
The Burkes successfully completed 30 hours of training, even earning the praise of their instructor, who noted that the couple improved the value of the training for others participating in the program.
Mike and Kitty Burke were interviewed extensively, and a DCF home study written assessment of the couple was completed.
