Every divorced Christian parent just woke up to their worst nightmare.
The government taking control of how they can practice their faith.
And a Maine judge banned a mother from taking her daughter to church for this awful reason.
Court Gives Atheist Father Total Veto Power Over Daughter's Faith
Emily Bickford's 12-year-old daughter Ava wanted to be baptized.
She'd been attending Calvary Chapel, an evangelical church in Portland, Maine, with her mother for three years and made the decision on her own.
When Ava excitedly told her father Matthew Bradeen about her baptism plans, he went straight to court to stop it.¹
Bradeen never married Bickford. She has primary custody. He has visitation rights.
But that didn't stop Portland District Court Judge Jennifer Nofsinger — a former ACLU president — from handing him a nuclear weapon against his daughter's faith.
The December 2024 order gave Bradeen exclusive control over all religious decisions for Ava.
Not just at his house. At her mother's house too.
Bickford can't take Ava to Calvary Chapel or any other church without Bradeen's approval.²
And Bradeen has refused to approve any church. Ever.³
The order bans Ava from associating with her church friends, attending any Christmas or Easter service at any church, participating in any religious organization including food banks and homeless shelters, or reading the Bible.⁴
"She would like to come to church. She misses her friends," Bickford told reporters after appealing to the Maine Supreme Court. "It's unconstitutional."⁵
Your ex can now use the courts to erase your child's faith during your own custody time. Let that sink in.
Judge Flew in Marxist "Expert" Who Called Evangelical Church a Cult
Here's how Bradeen pulled this off.
He hired Dr. Janja Lalich, a California sociology professor who describes herself as an expert on cults, and flew her to Maine to testify.⁶
Lalich isn't a psychologist. She has no background in child psychology.
But she told Judge Nofsinger she'd "studied" Calvary Chapel and determined it was dangerous.⁷
Her evidence? The pastor is a "charismatic" speaker who speaks "authoritatively" and teaches that the Bible contains objective truth.⁸
That's it. That makes it a cult in her expert opinion.
Based on this testimony, Judge Nofsinger ruled that teachings about hell, demons, and spiritual warfare posed "potential psychological harm" to Ava.⁹
The proof of this devastating psychological damage?
Ava scribbled notes about the rapture coming and worried her father might not go to heaven because he didn't attend church with her.¹⁰
Normal expressions of Christian faith from a 12-year-old who loves Jesus and is concerned about her father's soul.
The court treated that as evidence of psychological abuse.
"The judge found that Emily is a fit parent EXCEPT for the fact that she is a Christian," Liberty Counsel Chairman Mat Staver explained.¹¹
Judge Nofsinger deliberately refused to capitalize the word "God" throughout her order — using lowercase "god" the same way Bradeen did in his complaint.¹²
"I've never seen in the history of my career an order as hostile as this one," Staver told the Maine Supreme Court during oral arguments. "That order reeks with that kind of hostility."¹³
This Destroys Decades of Supreme Court Precedent Protecting Parents
The Maine Supreme Court heard arguments November 13, and several justices clearly recognized the constitutional crisis this order creates.
"This is a nuclear option, where you give total authority to one parent to make decisions regarding religion over the other parent, who's a fit parent," Staver argued.¹⁴
For more than a century, the U.S. Supreme Court has held that parents have a fundamental right to direct their children's religious upbringing.
In Wisconsin v. Yoder, the Court declared "the primary role of the parents in the upbringing of their children is now established beyond debate as an enduring American tradition."¹⁵
The Supreme Court said it even more directly in Troxel v. Granville — parental rights are "perhaps the oldest of the fundamental liberty interests" the Court has ever recognized.¹⁶
Courts can only override a fit parent's decisions when there's actual proof of harm or neglect.
Not anxiety, disagreement, or notes about the rapture.
"There is no finding of abuse or neglect," Staver told the justices. "The child 'at one time was observed to have anxiety,' once had 'an observance of a panic attack,' left 'notes around the house,' and wrote in a workbook 'that this demon image was scary.'"¹⁷
That's the entire basis for stripping a fit mother of her constitutional right to raise her daughter in her Christian faith.
A 12-year-old got anxious and left some notes about Jesus coming back.
Several justices told Staver the order appeared to treat Christian belief as inherently dangerous while presenting secularism as neutral.¹⁸
But secularism isn't neutral. It's a competing worldview that teaches there is no God, no objective truth, no salvation.
The court just decided that worldview is safe for children while Christianity is harmful.
Every Christian Parent With an Ex Is Now at Risk
Here's what makes this case terrifying for millions of Americans.
If this order stands, any non-believing ex-spouse can weaponize the courts to shut down their child's Christian upbringing simply by hiring an expert to claim biblical teachings cause anxiety.
Your daughter mentions hell? That's psychological abuse.
Your son worries about family members who don't know Jesus? That's harmful indoctrination.
Your kid talks about spiritual warfare or the End Times? Time to ban church attendance.
This isn't about one family in Maine anymore.
Divorce courts across America are watching to see if they can adopt this same framework — treating Christianity as dangerous while enforcing secular atheism as the court-approved default.
"It affects not only our family, but the families of all Christian children," Bickford told reporters.¹⁹
She's right.
The moment a judge can rule that teaching your child about Jesus poses "potential psychological harm," every divorced Christian parent in America loses their constitutional rights.
The Maine Supreme Court will issue its decision "in due time."²⁰
But there's no gray area here.
A fit parent has the right to take her daughter to church and teach her the Bible.
That's not negotiable. That's not debatable. That's the First Amendment and 100 years of Supreme Court precedent.
Anything less is judicial tyranny dressed up as concern for children's welfare.
And if Maine's high court doesn't reverse this order, every church in America better prepare for an avalanche of custody cases where secular ex-spouses demand veto power over their children's faith.
¹ Liberty Counsel, "Maine Supreme Court To Hear Religious Freedom Case," November 12, 2025.
² Ibid.
³ Ibid.
⁴ Ibid.
⁵ WMTW, "Maine justices consider whether custody order can block mother from church visits," November 13, 2025.
⁶ Liberty Counsel, "Maine Supreme Court To Hear Religious Freedom Case," November 12, 2025.
⁷ Ibid.
⁸ Ibid.
⁹ Newsweek, "Mom Battles Judge's Order Banning Her Taking Daughter to Church," November 17, 2025.
¹⁰ NEWS CENTER Maine, "Maine Supreme Court weighs case on religious freedom, parental rights," November 13, 2025.
¹¹ Liberty Counsel, "Maine Supreme Court To Hear Religious Freedom Case," November 12, 2025.
¹² Ibid.
¹³ Newsweek, "Mom Battles Judge's Order Banning Her Taking Daughter to Church," November 17, 2025.
¹⁴ WMTW, "Maine justices consider whether custody order can block mother from church visits," November 13, 2025.
¹⁵ Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972).
¹⁶ Troxel v. Granville, 530 U.S. 57 (2000).
¹⁷ Liberty Counsel Brief to Maine Supreme Court, April 2025.
¹⁸ Liberty Counsel statement, November 14, 2025.
¹⁹ NEWS CENTER Maine, "Maine Supreme Court weighs case on religious freedom, parental rights," November 13, 2025.
²⁰ WMTW, "Maine justices consider whether custody order can block mother from church visits," November 13, 2025.
