Father said church teachings on rapture caused daughter’s panic attack
The Maine Supreme Judicial Court ruled Tuesday that a Portland District Court judge acted correctly in giving a father the power to decide whether his daughter could attend an evangelical church, keeping in place the lower court’s 2024 ruling in a custody dispute over the girl’s religious upbringing.
The Sept. 1 decision resolves a clash between Matthew Bradeen and Emily Bickford, the parents of a daughter who was 11 at the time of the underlying dispute. Bickford had been bringing her daughter to multiple services a week at Calvary Chapel Greater Portland, an evangelical church in Westbrook. Bradeen objected, calling the church a “dangerous and harmful environment” that he said had caused his daughter to suffer from anxiety.
Bradeen said the girl had a panic attack after hearing the church’s teachings on the rapture — the belief that Christians will join God at the end of the world and that nonbelievers will be left behind.
The decision leaves intact the lower-court arrangement under which Bradeen holds the authority to determine whether his daughter attends the church.