The Department of Justice (DOJ) joined in a lawsuit filed by Catholic nuns against a New York law that forces nursing facilities to require that women’s units accommodate transgender women, who are biologically male.

The Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne, who have cared for terminal cancer patients at no charge for 125 years, sued the state after the New York Department of Health sent them three warnings about not following the transgender policies.

One letter warns about “refusing to assign a room to a resident other than in accordance with the resident’s gender identity,” “prohibiting a resident from using a restroom available to other persons of the same gender identity,” and “willfully and repeatedly failing to use a resident’s preferred name or pronouns after being clearly informed of the preferred name or pronouns.”

On June 18, the DOJ notified the U.S. District Court of its intent to intervene on behalf of the sisters, asserting that New York’s law violates their constitutional right to equal protection as a religious group.

“States should take notice that they cannot require Americans to abandon their religious beliefs in the name of woke gender ideology,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the DOJ Civil Rights Division said in a statement.

“For more than a century, the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne have provided free palliative care to indigent cancer patients in their last days,” she said. “New York’s law would force these religious women to choose between their faith and their license if they wish to continue serving the dying.”

The sisters argue that the state is violating their First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion. They also argue their First Amendment rights are being violated because the state is trying to force them to communicate a point of view with which they disagree.

The Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne operate Rosary Hill Home, a 42-bed nursing home in Thornwood, New York.