{"id":2021,"date":"2010-03-02T17:32:39","date_gmt":"2010-03-02T17:32:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp.php"},"modified":"2010-03-02T17:32:39","modified_gmt":"2010-03-02T17:32:39","slug":"dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp","title":{"rendered":"D.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON (RNS) The Archdiocese of Washington’s social service branch will stop offering benefits to spouses of new employees in a bid to balance the District of Columbia’s new same-sex marriage law with Catholic opposition to homosexuality.
\nEdward Orzechowski, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of Washington, informed the group’s 850 employees of the change in a letter on Monday (March 1), two days before gay marriage is scheduled to become legal in the city.
\n“We sincerely regret that we have to make this change,” said Orzechowski, “but it is necessary to allow Catholic Charities to continue to provide essential services to the clients we serve in partnership with the District of Columbia while remaining consistent with the tenets of our religious faith.”
\nEmployees whose spouses or children are currently covered will not be affected by the new policy, Orzechowski said. The local Catholic Charities agency serves 120,000 people yearly in the District and five Maryland counties, according to the archdiocese.
\nWashington’s City Council voted in December to legalize gay marriage over the strenuous objections of the archdiocese, which argued that the bill should have had stronger protections for religious groups that oppose homosexuality.
\nFaced with a similar dilemma several years ago, the Archdiocese of San Francisco took a different approach to benefits, allowing employees to choose from a range of “domestic partners” including parents or siblings, to add to their coverage.
\nLast month, Catholic Charities transferred its foster care program, including 43 children, 35 families and seven employees, to another provider, rather than potentially be forced to place children with gay couples. Affiliated groups in San Francisco and Boston have taken similar actions.
\n— Daniel Burke
\nCopyright 2010 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON (RNS) The Archdiocese of Washington’s social service branch will stop offering benefits to spouses of new employees in a bid to balance the District of Columbia’s new same-sex marriage law with Catholic opposition to homosexuality. Edward Orzechowski, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of Washington, informed the group’s 850 employees of the change in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nD.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"D.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"WASHINGTON (RNS) The Archdiocese of Washington’s social service branch will stop offering benefits to spouses of new employees in a bid to balance the District of Columbia’s new same-sex marriage law with Catholic opposition to homosexuality. Edward Orzechowski, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of Washington, informed the group’s 850 employees of the change in…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-03-02T17:32:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"mconsoli\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"D.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"D.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute","og_description":"WASHINGTON (RNS) The Archdiocese of Washington’s social service branch will stop offering benefits to spouses of new employees in a bid to balance the District of Columbia’s new same-sex marriage law with Catholic opposition to homosexuality. Edward Orzechowski, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of Washington, informed the group’s 850 employees of the change in…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2010-03-02T17:32:39+00:00","author":"mconsoli","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp","name":"D.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website"},"datePublished":"2010-03-02T17:32:39+00:00","dateModified":"2010-03-02T17:32:39+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/9cadc277e135f295b85f71137e2447a6"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/03\/dc-catholic-charities-drops-sp#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"D.C. Catholic Charities Drops Spousal Benefits in Gay Marriage Dispute"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/","name":"Beliefnet News","description":"Top Religious News From Around the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/9cadc277e135f295b85f71137e2447a6","name":"mconsoli","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/2ad\/2ad44a0d65de6022a5c619dffa5e7fddx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/2ad\/2ad44a0d65de6022a5c619dffa5e7fddx96.jpg","caption":"mconsoli"},"description":"\"Moderation is the center wherein all philosophies, both human and divine, meet.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d -Benjamin Disraeli","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author\/mconsoli"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2021\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}