Court Opinion

ID: 9580798
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:09:06.400627+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:36:32.611937
License: Public Domain

Grant, J.,
concurring.
I concur fully in the court’s opinion and holding. I write only to add that I see no reason why a court should not use its common sense in applying the command of Neb. Rev. Stat. § 42-364 (Reissue 1988) that “visitation of minor children shall be determined on the basis of their best interests.” I do not see how one parent with one set of religious beliefs and one parent with a different, conflicting set of religious beliefs can raise their minor children with full training and instruction in each parent’s beliefs without reducing their minor children to a totally confused, psychologically disastrous state. The trial court in this case was not promoting one religion over another, but was trying to so act that these young children could retain their sanity and survive mentally to an adult age when they could choose their own beliefs. In view of the best interests of the children, I see no error, constitutional or otherwise, in the trial court’s actions.
Hastings, C. J., and Boslaugh , J., j oin in this concurrence.
Fahrnbruch, J., concurring.
I concur with the majority opinion. The parents’ religious conflict has clearly detrimentally affected the general welfare of the older child. Because of the magnitude and intensity of the conflict, it not only likely will, but inevitably will, detrimentally affect the general welfare of the younger child. The majority opinion protects the welfare of the LeDoux children by adhering to the prior holdings of this court that the custodial parent normally has the right to control the religious training of the children of a marriage. Goodman v. Goodman, 180 Neb. 83, 141 N.W.2d 445 (1966). See, also, Burnham v. Burnham, 208 Neb. 498, 304 N.W.2d 58 (1981).