Emily Bickford has lost her appeal before Maine’s highest court and remains barred from taking her daughter to church.
The Maine Supreme Judicial Court affirmed on Tuesday a December 2024 custody order that gave Matthew Bradeen, the father of Bickford’s now-13-year-old daughter, sole authority to decide whether the child could attend Calvary Chapel in Westbrook, Maine. Bradeen, 47, had argued the evangelical congregation was a “dangerous and harmful environment” that triggered anxiety and panic attacks in the then-11-year-old after she heard teachings about the rapture, the belief that Christians will ascend to heaven at the world’s end while nonbelievers remain on Earth.
Bickford’s legal team, led by Mat Staver of the Christian nonprofit Liberty Counsel, had challenged the order as a violation of her First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The case was first argued before the state’s top court in November 2025, and the same panel upheld the lower ruling this week.
The Portland District Court judge’s original opinion had referred to Calvary Chapel as a “cult,” a characterization Bickford’s attorneys argued showed judicial hostility toward her faith. The Supreme Judicial Court rejected that claim in its published opinion.
“The 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, 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 opinion stated.
“The court’s finding reflected simply 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,” the opinion concluded.
Liberty Counsel announced immediately after the ruling that it would seek review from the U.S. Supreme Court.
“A Christian mom in Maine has been prohibited from taking her 13-year-old daughter to church or even read the Bible to her for nearly two years — not even for an Easter or Christmas service or a Bible study,” the group wrote in a statement posted on X.
“We are fighting for Emily’s right to raise her daughter in accordance with her Christian beliefs and will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to take this case and OVERRULE this decision,” the statement continued.
Staver, founder and chairman of Liberty Counsel, framed the dispute as having broad constitutional stakes. “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,” he said. “The implications of this opinion pose a serious threat to religious freedom.”
The December 2024 order emerged from a custody battle in which Bradeen persuaded the district court that his daughter’s exposure to Calvary Chapel’s teachings had caused measurable psychological harm. The court found that Bickford not only brought the child to services where the rapture was discussed but also allowed or enabled messages that cast Bradeen as an adversary to the girl’s religious life. The judge responded by stripping Bickford of any say in her daughter’s religious upbringing and giving Bradeen exclusive control over whether the child could attend any services at the Westbrook church.
Liberty Counsel has not yet filed its petition for certiorari with the nation’s highest court but indicated the filing would come promptly.