CHICAGO — A nasty Cook County divorce case has turned into a bitter struggle over religion, and could involve jail time.
At issue?
How much influence divorced parents should have over their child’s religion.
It was photos of his baby daughter’s baptism that landed Joseph Reyes in hot water with his estranged wife, Rebecca, and could now lead to jail time, or a fine, for criminal contempt.
“It doesn’t feel good, that’s for certain,” said Reyes. “I’m really doing nothing more than being the best dad that I can to my daughter.”
Reyes grew up a Catholic then converted to Judaism before marriage. They had an agreement, his wife said, to raise their daughter in the Jewish faith.
But when the marriage fell apart, Reyes, during a visitation, had his daughter baptized, and sent the pictures to his wife.
“If he did this, what was he going to do next,” said Steven Lake, of the law firm of Lake, Toback, which represents Rebecca Reyes. “So we went to court basically to put a Band-Aid on the situation until the trial.”
Rebecca Reyes obtained a temporary court order prohibiting her estranged husband from exposing the child to any religions other than Judaism, until their upcoming divorce trial.
After the order was entered, however, she learned that Joseph Reyes had taken their daughter to a service at Holy Name Cathedral.
So she sought to have him held in criminal contempt for violating the judge’s order. He was arraigned today and pleaded not guilty.
Reyes said he hasn’t violated the judge’s order, “because I think that Christianity and moreover Catholicism is just a radicalized form of Judaism. And there are a lot of theologists that will agree with me on that point.”
Attorney Lake said, “I’m not a religious expert, but if he can convince a judge that that’s the case, God bless him.”
Read the original article from FOX Chicago News.
Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services