In Sweden, a Christian couple is going through a nightmare that captures the growing bias and targeting of religious families in Europe. Daniel and Bianca Samson have been fighting to regain custody of their daughters since 2022 after the government cited their regular church attendance and faith as warranting their removal.
The parents, with the help of the Alliance Defending Freedom International, were delivered another blow after the European Court of Human Rights refused to accept their appeal as “inadmissible.”
This saga began when their eldest daughter had a fight with her parents over being denied a smartphone and makeup. She contacted police and made a false report of abuse.
However, Sara, quickly retracted the allegation and police found no evidence of abuse. Nevertheless, the state took both girls — aged 10 and 11 at the time –and refused to allow them to return home.
The government alleged that they found evidence of “religious extremism” and, according to ADF, cited the family’s habit of attending church three times a week. It also cited strict religious upbringing in the home. In the United States, the findings would be glaring violations of the free exercise clause of the First Amendment. In Sweden, it is a viable basis for taking away your children.
So these girls want to go home and the parents want to restore their family. The Swedish government and courts refuse to allow it.
They are still separated after the parents successfully completed state-mandated parenting courses. They also were denied requests to move the girls into foster homes in Romania, where they live. The Swedish Supreme Court refused to hear the case last year, but the European Court of Human Rights said that they had failed “to exhaust legal remedies in Sweden.”
Now, according to the ADF International, the government is moving to place the girls up for adoption.
The children have moved from foster home to foster home, including allegedly one placement that resulted in one of the girl’s suffering physical and mental health issues. She ultimately tried to commit suicide, according to the family.
I have only found articles attesting to the removal on the grounds of the family’s religious faith and practices. The implications are chilling if true. This family appears to have done everything demanded of them as their daughters begged to return home.
It is a case worthy of inquiry by the Administration in defense of religious liberty.
If you are ever in Hawaii and you are coming out of the water wearing a towel to cover you wet hair and hungry looking for somewhere to grab a bite never, ever go up to the food stand and say Aloha Snack Bar.
Why is the United States continuing its membership with NATO and paying the bulk of the expenses? Why are we supporting the tyrannical European Regimes when the don’t share our values for freedom of speech and religion? The European countries we vow to defend are much more aligned with Russia and China in the freedoms they allow their citizens. Let them fend for themselves or become part of their communistic brethren. There is no need to waste the money and possibly our soldiers’ lives defending these countries. Especially now when they won’t even help us keep their Oil and Natural Gas flowing in the Strait of Hormuz.
Turley is projecting American constitutional law (where parents have nearly absolute control) onto a European rights-based system (where children are autonomous rights-holders). Losing a right you never had in that jurisdiction isn’t “suppression.”
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) found the Samsons’ appeal inadmissible precisely because the parents failed to demonstrate a violation of the European Convention. By omitting the Court’s reasoning—likely that the state’s intervention met the high bar for protecting a child’s welfare—Turley is conflating the loss of a legal argument with the suppression of a faith. This isn’t a ‘crackdown’ on religion; it is the uniform application of a secular ‘best interests’ standard that Turley thinks shouldn’t apply because it does not comport to American standards.
X, that has it backwards. Turley is not trying to export the First Amendment to Europe. He is saying that the freedom of parents to live and teach their faith is a human right that governments do not create and do not have the moral authority to take away. The fact that a particular court refuses to recognize that right does not mean it does not exist. It means the court has decided that the state’s view of “best interests” outweighs the parents’ faith and the children’s own stated desire to go home.
And whatever label you put on the legal system, it is not honest to say this has nothing to do with a crackdown on religion when the same state papers that kept these girls from their parents for years treat normal Christian practices like no makeup for young girls, limits on phones, and going to church three times a week as evidence of “religious extremism.” You can argue that this is a good use of state power if you like, but you cannot pretend it is neutral with respect to religion or to the parents’ way of life.
Yea… good one… now hope you go to live in such a system does not regard ANY right that are not given to you BY THE GOVERNMENT! Of course not having a REAL CONSITUTION means…. NOT HAVING A REAL CONSITUTION and is why they are a backwards society!
Professor Turlay- Please find a way to remove the trolls from the comments. Some of us want to see a serious discussion of the key issues.
That would be censorship. Turley is against censoring speech, even the trolls have free speech rights.
Yes, I understand that. But it makes a mess of what would have been a useful discussion.
The core issue isn’t a ‘war on Christianity,’ but a fundamental difference in how sovereign nations balance parental authority versus child welfare. Sweden’s LVU law is applied to any household where parenting choices are deemed to isolate a child from broader society, regardless of whether that isolation is based on secular, Muslim, or Christian beliefs.
Turley’s argument relies on an American legal standard that simply does not exist in Sweden’s rights-based social model.
The legal conflict centers on the Care of Young Persons Act (LVU), a Swedish law that allows the state to take children into compulsory care if there is a “significant risk of harm” to their health or development. Turley failed to mention the child in question tried to commit suicide. Which is something the state deemed sufficient to take custody.
Then there’s the ruling, court denied the appeal only because the family did not exhaust all legal avenues in the Swedish judicial system. A technicality Turley ‘neglected’ to mention.
X, George, Is there nothing that you won’t defend just to be the “other side”? Try the shoe on the other foot example and try to imagine being in these people’s position. You truly should be ashamed of yourself.
X, George, so badly wants to be a lawyer that he thinks it is funny, cute or intelligent to make asinine arguments because he thinks that is what a legally trained mind does in defense of their clients. What he is missing is that a) he is not a lawyer, b) this isn’t a courtroom, c) these are real life people, i.e. parents that want their kids back and kids that want to be back with their parents which is tragic and not a “fun legal exercise”. There isn’t a crime here, there isn’t a victim here, other than the people X is arguing against with some mumbo jumbo moronic “legal” argument and this isn’t a REAL attorney defending a client from the state that is trying to imprison him. This is fascist, radical, anti-Catholic bigotry that is being defended with empty words by fools like X.
“In the United States, the findings would be glaring violations of the free exercise clause of the First Amendment.” This is not true. The United States is just as likely to void religious freedoms. See Washington State Judge Lori K Smith
…”In the United States, the findings would be glaring violations of the free exercise clause of the First Amendment. In Sweden, it is a viable basis for taking away your children. …”
This is True, BUT it does not mean it does not happen in America. Interdiction on some level (Family/Relitives) is warranted in ‘Religious Extremism’.
AI: ( Katie Holmes rescue her daughter from the Church of Scientology )
Yes, reports indicate that Katie Holmes took steps to separate her daughter, Suri Cruise, from the Church of Scientology by initiating a secret, planned divorce from Tom Cruise in 2012. Holmes sought and was granted primary/sole custody of Suri, allowing her to raise her daughter outside of the religion.
Key details regarding this situation include:
Motivation: Reports suggested Holmes feared Tom Cruise was preparing to enroll Suri in “Sea Org,” a strict, “ultrazealous” Scientology group.
“Secret” Escape: Holmes planned her exit for months, using disposable phones and blindsiding Cruise while he was filming in Iceland.
Custody and Protection: Holmes was granted primary custody, and the divorce settlement reportedly included provisions to keep Suri away from Scientology schools, camps, and activities.
Result: Following the divorce, Suri grew up in New York City with her mother, separated from Scientology and estranged from her father.
Confirmation: In a 2013 deposition, Tom Cruise acknowledged that the Church of Scientology played a role in the divorce and confirmed that Katie fled to protect Suri from the religion.
After the divorce, Suri did not continue to practice Scientology.
Holmes had to flee Tom’s ‘cuckoo’ Scientology for herself and Suri
By: Andrea Peyser ~ July 5, 2012
https://nypost.com/2012/07/05/holmes-had-to-flee-toms-cuckoo-scientology-for-herself-and-suri/
Gold Base:
According to some former members of Scientology, conditions within Gold Base are harsh, with staff members receiving sporadic paychecks of $50 at most, working seven days a week, and being subjected to punishments for failing to meet work quotas. Media reports have stated that around 100 people a year try to escape from the base but most are soon retrieved by “pursuit teams”.[better source needed] Despite many accounts of mistreatment from ex-members, law enforcement investigations and lawsuits against Scientology have been thwarted by the First Amendment’s guarantee of religious freedom and the church’s ability to rely on “ministerial exemptions” in employment law. Scientology denies any mistreatment and calls the base “the ideal setting for professional and spiritual growth”
[Link] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Base
The conditions you describe are hardly analogous to the case in Sweeden..Not even close.
Intervention by the State or Other is warranted in the interdiction of Religious Extremism upon minors (Child Abuse). Yes it dose happen in the United States.
AI:
Several organizations in the U.S. have been identified as religious or high-control groups involving sexual abuse, exploitation, or coerced practices. Notable examples include NXIVM, The Family International, the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), and the Branch Davidians under David Koresh.
Here are specific examples of religious or quasi-religious cults in the U.S.:
NXIVM: Led by Keith Raniere, this group operated in the U.S. and other countries as a “human potential” program but functioned as a sex trafficking organization. Its inner circle, “DOS,” involved branding women and coerced sexual servitude. Raniere was convicted in 2019 of racketeering and sex trafficking.
The Family International (formerly Children of God): Founded by David Brandt Berg, this group was accused of systematic child sexual abuse and sexual abuse of members, a practice often dubbed “Flirty Fishing” during its peak.
Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS): Under leader Warren Jeffs, the FLDS was characterized by forced marriages, polygyny, and accusations of child sexual abuse. The group enforced rules that assigned women to “seed bearers” for procreation.
Branch Davidians: Led by David Koresh in Waco, Texas, this group became known for allegations of polygamy, where Koresh claimed the right to take any woman or child within the community for himself.
The Finders: A small group that drew attention in 1987 due to accusations of child abuse and suspicions of being an “international pedophile ring”.
These groups often used authoritarian structures, spiritual manipulation, and isolation to control members and engage in sexual abuse.
4 Notorious Cults in American History
By HeinOnline Blogger ~ October 13, 2023
https://home.heinonline.org/blog/2023/10/4-notorious-cults-in-american-history/
Children of God cult was ‘hell on earth’
By: Steven Brocklehurst – BBC ~ 26 June 2018
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-44613932
It is possible that parental pressure upon a child to religious belief and practice could constitute child abuse.
Kevin, that is a very broad claim. Can you say more about what you have in mind when you call “parental pressure” child abuse here, and give an example or two of where you think the line is crossed?
Any religious indoctrination of children should be classified as child abuse.
There is no god. Mankind creates gods, not the other way around.
Throughout history, mankind has worshiped over 1,000 gods of some kind. Reason and science has reduced that number to one, so we are almost there.
The only rational position is to ban the religious indoctrination of innocent children.
The only thing that surprises me about this story from Sweden is that the Samson parents actually found a church that offered services 3 times a week. Sweden is one of the least religious countries in the world. Only 5% of people attend church services. In the last 25 years more than 40% of churches have simply been shuttered from lack of attendance.
The Samson family has actually moved back to Romania, where they originally came from, possibly because the churches are closing and they could not find one that offered services as frequently as they need to meet their extremist values.
Sweden is definitely leading the rest of the world in the elimination of religion, and it can’t come soon enough.
You are a complete hypocrite. You use your own religious views – atheism – to justify the marginalization of someone else’s. If parents adhere to your beliefs, they get to keep their kids. How are you any different than any other religious extremist? And yes, atheism is a religious view.
If people stop believing there is anything higher than the state, they just took one of the main brakes off state power. That is what you see in Sweden: ties to church, family, and old moral habits get weaker, and the political class gets used to the idea that it can manage the church or push it aside whenever it wants. That is not hard‑core totalitarianism yet, but it is the kind of soft, state‑managed “freedom” that makes it a lot easier to slide into something worse, because there is nothing above the state that people feel bound to answer to anymore.
Kevin, try to imagine a state coming after a Muslim family in this way.
False allegations are an inescapable fact of life. But the last half century has seen the erosion of the common sense that previously provided restraint to the exercise of government authority. The discretion of the beat cop, the wisdom of the supervisor, the judiciousness of the prosecutor, have been undermined by dogmatic ideologies (academic, social, political) which, in the hands of dullards and cowards, produce unimaginable nightmares.
Spot on
Agree, PT.
I’m amazed at how little has been said in comments about European values illustrated by this case
How Swedish citizens could let their country degrade to the point where children can be removed from good homes, just because of the peaceful and private practice of religion, is beyond me.
One thing is for sure. Had this been a Muslim family, the courts would have ruled for the family to deflect from being accused of Islamophobia.
It’s only Christians and Jews who are now restricted from the free practice of their religion in Europe.
Cliff you are exactly right. Muslims have a freedom that no other religion has which is ironic because Islam wants less freedom for millions around the globe.
If the Professor gets the US GOVERNMENT to take this issue, he has some serious pull…
“The resilience of Israelis under constant attack from rockets and drones is amazing. They are still the eighth happiest nation in the world. While sirens are blaring, they protect Arab children. Under constant pressures, they fund events for orphans, conduct life-saving research, fight cancer, and transplant organs. Women command missile boats, and even soldiers with disabilities are eager to enlist. While rockets fall and drones explode, Israelis embark on projects to turn seawater into drinking water, generate renewable energy, construct buildings more efficiently, and explore the universe. Meanwhile, their efforts attract huge amounts of foreign investment to continue the incredible work of the Startup Nation.” – Michael Ordman
Psalm 59:16: “But I will sing of your strength, in the morning I will sing of your love; for you are my fortress, my refuge in times of trouble”. rsk