Today's Wall Street Journal has a disturbing story about a church deemed too risky for property insurance because it supports gay rights. The reason cited by the carrier is that taking a controversial position backing same-sex marriage and ordination of homosexuals means there's a greater threat of property damage and litigation against the church. Is this sound underwriting or homophobia? I would guess the latter. How about you?


The story involves the West Adrian United Church of Christ in Adrian, Mich. The carrier that took a pass on the account is Brotherhood Mutual Insurance Company of Fort Wayne, Ind., which reportedly serves about 30,000 houses of worship in 29 states and Washington, D.C.

(I would like to link you to the news story on which this blog is based, but you would need to be a Wall Street Journal subscriber to access it. The story, “Insurer Judges A Church's Stance As Too Risky,” appears on page A8 of the Jan. 8 edition.)

Recommended For You

Want to continue reading?
Become a Free PropertyCasualty360 Digital Reader

Your access to unlimited PropertyCasualty360 content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:

  • Breaking insurance news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
  • Weekly Insurance Speak podcast featuring exclusive interviews with industry leaders
  • Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
  • Critical converage of the employee benefits and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, BenefitsPRO and ThinkAdvisor
NOT FOR REPRINT

© Touchpoint Markets, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more inforrmation visit Asset & Logo Licensing.