Sacramento, Calif., Jul 6, 2016 / 02:02 am
A California court ruled last week that ChristianMingle and it's affiliate faith-based dating websites must allow LGBT singles to search and be matched with people of the same gender.
The ruling comes at the end of a 2.5 year legal battle after two gay men noticed in 2013 that new members to the popular dating site, which boasts over 15 million users, could only search for dates of the opposite sex.
The men filed a lawsuit on discrimination charges against Spark Networks, which owns ChristianMingle and a host of other faith-based dating websites, including CatholicMingle, JDate (Jewish Date), and LDSSingles.com, the "largest dating site by Mormons for Mormons."
"Spark has engaged in a systemic and intentional pattern and practice of arbitrary discrimination against gays and lesbians throughout California by denying them full and equal services, accommodations, advantages and privileges in connection with many of its commercial dating services," the lawsuit filed in 2013 said.