The Maine Supreme Court has upheld a lower court ruling in the case concerning a father’s right to have the final say on whether or not his daughter can attend church services with her mother.
This marks the latest development in an ongoing dispute between Matthew Bradeen and Emily Bickford over the religious upbringing of their daughter, who was 11 in 2024.
Bickford brought her to multiple services a week at Calvary Chapel Greater Portland, and Bradeen argued that doing so was harmful to their child, citing panic attacks and anxiety related to the church’s teachings on the rapture.
Bradeen also suggested that some of the language employed by the church was “psychologically damaging the child” as a result of how it was said to have characterized him.
During one service, Bradeen and his daughter were mentioned “almost 30 times” during a lengthy prayer focused on the dispute, at which time Bradeen was also described as “in need of salvation,” and the family’s custody proceedings were said to be “an attack on God’s Word.”
A lower court found that while the parents would continue sharing responsibility for determining their child’s religious upbringing, the father would have the final say in the event of a disagreement over her involvement with a religious organization. Maine’s highest court upheld that position Tuesday.
Mathew Staver of Liberty Counsel, representing the mother, has said they intend to appeal the case to the United States Supreme Court.
In a brief to Maine’s highest court, Staver argued the lower court’s ruling demonstrated “open hostility” toward the mother’s religious beliefs and prevented her from directing the “religious upbringing of her child as she sees fit.”
In response to the Maine Supreme Court’s ruling, Liberty Counsel shared a press release Tuesday.
“This opinion rejects the First Amendment right of a fit parent to raise her child consistent with her Christian faith,” Staver said.
“This opinion goes against other state court decisions involving custody in the context of religious free exercise rights and ignores precedent from the U.S. Supreme Court,” he wrote. “We will ask the High Court to take this case and overrule the decision.”
“This disappointing opinion from the Maine Supreme Court prohibits Bickford from taking her child to a Christian church because the child’s father objects to its biblical teachings,” said Staver. “Depriving one parent their right to instill their religious views into their child and granting sole authority to the other parent fails to give proper protection to parental rights and religious freedom under the First Amendment.”
“The implications of this opinion pose a serious threat to religious freedom,” Staver concluded. “Liberty Counsel will petition the U.S. Supreme Court to ultimately decide this case.”
Click Here to Read the Full Press Release
Michelle King, the lawyer representing the father, said the Maine Supreme Court’s decision was “well thought-out and reasoned,” but she “anticipated all along” that it could be appealed to the nation’s highest authority.
“Anytime you’re in court, it’s stressful,” King said. “But this case has definitely garnered a lot of media attention, and I think that’s always difficult for parents.”
The Maine Supreme Court concluded that Bickford’s decision to allow her daughter to remain in the service while they were called out by name, and her later characterization of the incident as “appropriate,” showed that she “is unwilling to recognize, much less mitigate, the risk that these messages alienate the child from Bradeen or otherwise cause her harm.”
“The [lower] court found that the child was harmed by Bickford’s decisions to expose the child to messages that characterized Bradeen as an ‘enemy’ who seeks to ‘persecute’ the child and her faith,” the Maine Supreme Court said, “and by Bickford’s unwillingness to prevent the child from receiving those messages or to take any other steps to reduce the risk of alienating her from Bradeen.”
The Maine Supreme Court added that “it is harmful for a child to hear negative and frightening messages about one parent from the other parent or the other parent’s authority figures.”
Bickford and her legal team have 90 days to file a petition for review with the United States Supreme Court. The Justices would then have to decide whether or not to grant their petition.
siding with the dad-this is an aggressive church which doesn’t keep the teachings age appropriate