In a blow to religious autonomy, Catholic Charities has decided to voluntarily forgo offering further adoption services in Boston, to avoid an agonizing legal battle against a Massachusetts anti-discrimination statute.

James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 10, “Among the numerous advantages promised by a well-constructed Union, none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction. The friend of popular governments never finds himself more alarmed for their character and fate as when he contemplates their propensity to this dangerous vice.”

Madison was describing how a popular form of government like ours needs protection from large, powerful factions in politics that may use their numbers to take away the rights of citizens. It is good to remember Madison’s wise counsel when looking at the recent controversy in Boston involving equality versus religious liberty.

This past March, the Catholic humanitarian group called Catholic Charities stumbled into a troubling quandary in Boston. The charity’s office in Boston chose to give up its adoption-placement services altogether because of an irreconcilable difference with the state of Massachusetts. Catholic Charities chooses not to facilitate adoptions for gay couples because the charity’s religion does not agree with same-sex parentage. The anti-discrimination laws in Massachusetts, however, dictate that charities must serve homosexual patrons in the same way that they would serve heterosexual patrons in adoption placement. That being the case, Catholic Charities would lose its license to offer adoptions in Massachusetts if it did not abide by the statute. Rather than either fight an agonizing legal battle or agree to act against their religious faith, the charity organizers in Boston decided to voluntarily forgo offering further adoption services.

So a Catholic humanitarian group no longer helps prospective parents to find children because its religious beliefs conflict with state law. Is this a harmful situation for religious freedom in America? It is, and for many reasons.

But let’s begin with first principles — what do we mean by religious freedom? I will posit the simple explanation that religious freedom means that government will not make laws that infringe upon the belief in or the practice of an individual’s religion. That definition paraphrases the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. The state should not coerce an individual to act against his or her faith.

However, one may ask whether the Massachusetts case actually presents an example of state coercion. To find out, look at the anti-discrimination statute in question. Catholic Charities would lose its adoption license if it did not actively participate in Massachusetts’ official embrace of same-sex parentage.

The Boston case, therefore, shows a Catholic charity afraid of losing its liberty to practice part of its religious mission by going against a state law. Herein is the problem — the Christian belief that only one man and one woman may raise children as parents conflicts with the statute prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation. A religious charity should not be forced by a coercive power to do something contrary to its beliefs. Catholic Charities should not be compelled to choose between the law and its adoption services, which are central to its faith-based purpose. Adoption placements are a part of the charity’s mission to help those in need and to aid the building of strong, loving families. The fact that Catholic Charities reluctantly abandoned its adoption program in Boston to avoid a skirmish with the anti-discrimination statute is a sad loss for the community and a blow to religious autonomy.

The humanitarian workers of Catholic Charities cannot be faulted for solely seeking traditional, heterosexual couples to offer children for adoption. Their religion teaches that these couples are the only morally right ones in God’s eyes and are best equipped to raise children. Also, the admonition against homosexual activity and marriage is clear in the Catholic faith. Thus, if the charity workers were to seek gay couples to offer adoptions, their consciences might tell them that they were doing something contrary to the best interests of the adopted children.

Religious people should not have to disobey their consciences. When we look at a case like this, the key question should be whether anyone is harmed. Did the actions of Catholic Charities in carrying out its adoption services harm anyone? No, they did not. Gay couples were not harmed when the charity declined to help them find children to adopt. Homosexual couples would simply go elsewhere for such aid. Meanwhile, the charity workers would continue their good works while abiding by their moral beliefs. No one is hurt, so it’s best to leave well enough alone.

Unfortunately, the discrimination law made that freedom unpalatable. This is absurd because passively declining to participate in an activity (in this case, finding children for gay couples to adopt) does not harm anyone. Catholic Charities did not violate any fundamental state or societal interest by declining to offer children to gay couples. Unless a religion countenances something harmful to others (like, for example, human sacrifice), the government should not infringe upon citizens’ free practice of faith.  In the case of the Catholic Charities in Boston, the state attempted to coerce equality with respect to servicing people of all sexual orientations by threatening to withdraw licenses for offering adoption placements. But performing adoption services is an important part of the charity’s religious mission to serve humanity, and this time, the Christian humanitarians had to give it up.

Recently, Massachusetts authorities declared that no action would be taken against Catholic Charities, which of course is good news. But regardless of how this single case turns out, the broader issue of liberty versus equality should not be overlooked.

Coercion to further group rights is not called for when it comes at the expense of individual rights. Protecting homosexuals from discrimination is absolutely the right thing to do, but legitimate exceptions have to be made in religious matters. In the Boston case, no one was harmed when the Catholic workers simply wished to follow their church’s teaching that children should not be raised by gay couples. Gay couples seeking to adopt children would easily find someone else who would help them, and the charity workers would be free to adhere to their church’s beliefs. Since nobody came to harm before the anti-discrimination statute became a factor, the arrangement should have remained undisturbed. But Catholic Charities then suffered harm, losing its license to find children for parents.

Egalitarianism combined with political correctness causes anti-discrimination rules to have negative effects. Government officials so intensely desire to create political and social equality among citizens and to stamp out any semblance of discrimination that they engender foolish policy. Emerson said that foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds, and we see that clearly in the Catholic Charities matter. The anti-discrimination law reaches too far in trying to achieve egalitarian results, and excess PC prevents it from distinguishing between discrimination against gays and good-faith religious practice. The egalitarian policy translates into a heavy-handed utopianism that endangers individual religious liberty.

Religious liberty is, of course, precious to a free and civil society, which is why the Catholic charity deserves better. A civil society protects individual liberties like the freedom of worship and does not bow to passions that threaten them — including the passion for utopian equality. Edmund Burke knew that civil society could only survive if civil institutions like individual liberty were defended from overzealous passions. He stated that, “We procure reverence to our civil institutions on the principle upon which nature teaches us to revere individual men.” Civil society requires that “the inclinations of men should frequently be thwarted, their will controlled, and their passions brought into subjection.”

Statutes like the one in Massachusetts could lead to religious organizations being compelled to do other things in contravention of their church doctrine, such as recognizing same-sex marriage. It would be a great loss to community if more cases like this one came up and resulted in religious organizations across the country curtailing their charitable work, for religious charity contributes so much to the common good. For these reasons, anti-discrimination legislation should not degenerate into a weapon against religious groups. Then it becomes not a tool for defending equality, but a tool for destroying dissent.

Tolerance for many different groups of people does not require acquiescence to behavior that one’s faith rejects on moral grounds. That principle applies to the controversy about homosexual adoption. The state of Massachusetts ought to amend the discrimination law to exempt religious organizations from obligations that contradict their faith. Unless reform takes place, we may soon see more instances of state-sanctioned antagonism towards religion — and so much the worse for civil society.