A behavioral therapist says she was fired for refusing to counsel a gay couple, claiming her supervisor told her to be a “social worker first and a Catholic second,” according to a federal lawsuit.
Kathleen Lorentzen alleges that male supervisors at HealthSource Saginaw in Michigan mocked, physically intimated and discriminated against her after she told them she couldn’t provide marriage counseling to a gay couple due to her religious beliefs, the Detroit Free Press reports.
Lorentzen worked at the facility in Saginaw from 2011 through 2017 as an outpatient behavioral therapist and saw the couple twice last summer, according to the lawsuit filed late last week in US District Court.
She asked her supervisor, Mark Kraynak, if another therapist could meet with them due to the conflict with her religious belief that marriage is solely between a man and a woman.
That angered Kraynak, prompting him to tell Lorentzen during a meeting that she needed to be a “social worker first and a Catholic second,” according to the lawsuit.
Another executive at the rehab facility later gave Lorentzen notice that she’d be fired within 30 days. Lorentzen claims she was humiliated and physically intimidated in the following days by Kraynak, who intentionally closed a door on her and physically blocked her as she walked in a hallway, according to the lawsuit.
Lorentzen also claims that the facility told her clients that she was leaving the company — without telling her she had been fired.
“This action caused confusion with Mrs. Lonrentzen’s clients, many of whom felt angry, betrayed, or anxious about purportedly having to see a new therapist,” the lawsuit claims.
To make matters worse, the facility’s medical director later told Kraynak and another supervisor after learning why Lorentzen was leaving that the gay couple could simply have been referred to another therapist, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit — filed by the Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center, a Christian nonprofit law firm — seeks unspecified damages.
Calls seeking comment from HealthSource Saginaw officials were not immediately returned Tuesday.
