SAN FRANCISCO -- Lawyers with the National Center for Lesbian Rights said Tuesday their group is considering suing the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco if it bars its social service agency from allowing adoptions by same-sex couples.

Attorney Karen Doering said that if the archdiocese were to enforce such a ban, the center "absolutely would look at this very carefully and possibly take legal action."

Excluding same-sex couples from adoptions "is unlawful, is against state policy and hurts children," Doering said

Doering, a specialist in same-sex adoption law, works in the St. Petersburg, Fla., office of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, which is based in San Francisco.

She and center attorney Courtney Joslin of San Francisco said a ban on adoptions by same-sex couples would violate two California laws -- the Unruh Civil Rights Act and another law that specifically forbids sexual-orientation discrimination in adoption matters.

Doering said, "We feel fairly confident that if the archdiocese does start implementing such a policy, the state will step in to enforce its own laws, but if the state doesn't, we absolutely will consider filing a lawsuit."

Archdiocese spokesman Maurice Healy said the archdiocese is currently reviewing its adoption program.

In the past, Healy said, the archdiocese's social service arm, Catholic Charities of San Francisco, allowed five same-sex adoptions out of a total of 136 it arranged since 2000.

The archdiocese includes San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin counties. Catholic Charities specializes in finding homes for hard-to-place children.

Last week, the archdiocese issued a statement saying, "We fully accept and faithfully teach what the Catholic Church teaches on marriage and family life.

"In light of these convictions, we currently are reviewing our adoption programs to determine concretely how we can continue to best serve children who are so much in need of a home," the statement said.

Healy said church teaching "precludes adoption by same-sex couples."

He said that in the current review, "the question is not whether we're going to be in accord with church teaching" but rather, "what do we do now" to make sure that children in need find homes.

Healy said one example of a possible change in the program might be to engage in a major communications effort in order to increase the pool of potential adoptive families.

Healy also said the concept of "the greater good," which gives priority to an action resulting in the greatest benefit, may arise during the review of the adoption program.

But Healy said he could not say whether the "greater good" concept will be included and whether it might allow adoptions by same-sex couples in certain circumstances. The spokesman said he did not know when the review of the program would be completed.

Earlier this month, Archbishop William Levada, who headed the San Francisco archdiocese from 1995 to 2005, issued a statement saying "it has been, and remains, my position that Catholic agencies should not place children for adoption in homosexual households."

Levada now heads the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and is to be made a cardinal on March 24.

Healy said Levada's March 9 statement was "not an edict" and was issued in response to press inquiries related to a similar controversy concerning the Archdiocese of Boston.

On March 10, the Boston Archdiocese announced that its social service agency would stop providing adoption services because a state law would require it to allow adoptions by same-sex couples.

Healy said the San Francisco and Boston archdioceses have been the only dioceses in the nation that arranged adoptions by same-sex couples.

The San Francisco program has a budget of about $450,000, including some state and local funding, Healy said.

Nathan Barankin, a spokesman for California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, said state lawyers are looking into the issues but said he had no further comment.

Thom Lynch, executive director of the San Francisco Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Community Center, said, "The hypocrisy coming from Rome by the former San Francisco Archbishop William Levada is stunning."

Lynch said, "In light of the Catholic Church's own failures to protect children from predatory priests, the attack on gays and lesbians who desire to provide stable homes to children in need of love, care and family is all the more shocking."