Whether San Francisco’s gays and lesbians will be allowed to adopt children through city-funded Catholic Charities seems now to depend on who you ask.

Two weeks ago new Vatican Number Two and former San Francisco Archbishop William Levada issued a directive instructing San Francisco’s Catholic adoption agency that it must follow church doctrine and ban adoptions by gays and lesbians. Gay Catholic Supervisor Tom Ammiano wrote, and on Tuesday the Board of Supervisors unanimously passed, a resolution demanding that the group give up the planned ban, which would violate both city and state law, or face a loss of city funding.

This week Catholic Charities’ head Brian Cahill assured Ammiano that the group would retain its current policy of allowing gays to adopt, so Ammiano has backed down, for now, on his threat pull the plug on the group’s city contracts, which make up about 70 percent of its budget.
All’s well that ends well? Well, not quite.

On Monday, Archdiocesan spokesman Maurice Healy told reporters that he thinks new San Francisco Archbishop George Niederauer, Levada’s successor, wants to “bring its adoption program fully in sync with church views,” which since a 2003 statement by now-Pope Benedict XVI has banned adoptions by gays, saying that children in gay households will suffer “violence” at the hands of gay parents.

That is to say: “no.”

But Niederauer himself has been silent. So who speaks for the archdiocese?

“There is broad disagreement,” said Thom Lynch, who runs San Francisco’s LGBT Community Center and is a friend of Cahill’s. “I don’t think there’s a uniform view within the Archdiocese.”

Lynch said that Cahill is under attack by others in the Catholic hierarchy, but is getting some support from congregations, staffers and board members – some of whom are gay and lesbian.

But according to archdiocesan sources, the chain of command in the organization is rigid and top-down, and the ultimate authority is with new-Pope Benedict XVI, who, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, wrote the 2003 policy that called the idea of gay adoption “gravely immoral.”
And the reality?

Only five children out of 136 have been placed with gays or lesbians in the past five years, and those, Cahill has said, were “difficult to place” kids. So, critics charge, whatever the agency’s policies, appearances point to discrimination already.

But Lynch thinks maybe, because of the church’s other openly discriminatory policies, most prospective gay and lesbian parents look to adopt elsewhere first. “It’s a chilling effect; that’s what’s so horrible,” Ammiano said. But Ammiano added that he has not heard any complaints of discrimination about Catholic Charities’ adoption programs.

In Boston, faced with very similar sanctions for violating Massachusetts’ anti-discrimination laws, the Catholic Charities agency there announced it would close its adoption program last Friday.

Ammiano called Healy a “loose cannon” and said that Cahill, who has a gay son, has been forthright and determined on the issue.
Cahill’s friend Lynch said he has “incredible respect” for the Catholic Charities head. “I think he’s committed to doing the right thing.”
Ammiano will meet with Cahill on Thursday for further discussions.

Even if the agency agrees to allow adoptions by gays, just how the city would police the arrangement is unclear. Most adoption records are confidential. So Ammiano said the agency would have to provide accountability and probably sign a memorandum of understanding. “If in fact they’re going to do it, they’re going to have to memorialize that. He’s going to have to act in good faith,” Ammiano said.

That would put Cahill in direct conflict with his ultimate bosses in Rome.

“He may be a reluctant hero,” Ammiano said “but in a sense he is … But my worry is for his job.”

Neither Catholic Charities’ Executive Director Brian Cahill nor the Archdiocese’s communications director, Maurice Healy, returned repeated calls seeking comment for this article.