Here are some important law-and-religion news stories from around the web:
- The Tarrant County (TX) Republican party voted in support of its Vice Chairman Shahid Shafi (139-49) against efforts to remove him because of his Islamic faith.
- The Rowan County (NC) Board of Commissioners has agreed to pay $285,000 in legal fees to the ACLU, which represented three residents in their successful challenge to the Board’s Commissioner-led prayer practice.
- The European Court of Human Rights has agreed to take up a case to decide whether Belgium wrongly allowed a woman to be euthanized in 2012 after years of depression.
- The Alliance Defending Freedom has sued the city of Anchorage (AK) in an effort to prevent the faith-based Hope Center women’s shelter from having to accept transgender women.
- Freedom X, a Los Angeles-based conservative Christian group, sued the Huntington Beach City School District after two students ages ten and eight were allegedly barred from distributing flyers promoting “Bring Your Bible to School Day.”
- The Swedish Transportation Agency denied a man’s request for a license plate that includes the word “Christ” on the grounds that it could offend others.
- David Poulson, a former Catholic priest in the Diocese of Erie (PA), was sentenced to 2½ years to 14 years’ imprisonment after pleading guilty to corruption of minors and endangering the welfare of children.
- Liberty Counsel, an evangelical nonprofit that opposes gay rights, has taken issue with the Justice for Victims of Lynching Act and is lobbying House lawmakers to remove the bill’s “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” language.
- The European Court of Human Rights ruled against two homeschooling German parents who claimed compulsory school attendance laws violated their parental rights.
- Temple Beth El in Battle Creek (MI) was vandalized with spray paint—the second incident of vandalism at the synagogue since November.
- The Democratic Republic of Congo’s Catholic Church has denounced the shocking presidential election victory of opposition leader Felix Tshisekedi, the first victory by an opposition candidate in the country’s history.
- Clifton, New Jersey has agreed to pay Shomrei Torah $2.5 million and will allow the Jewish congregation to construct a synagogue after attorneys vowed to sue under RLUIPA if an agreement was not reached.
- The Delhi High Court ordered India’s Home Affairs Ministry to reinstate an American doctor’s visa to work in a Protestant hospital after his visa was cancelled and the doctor was deported in 2016.
- A lawsuit was filed Friday against Rev. Thomas M. O’Donnell, a priest in the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburg, accusing him of repeatedly sexually assaulting a 13-year-old boy on a trip to Super Bowl X in Miami (FL) in 1973.
- Presiding Bishop Michael Curry of the Episcopal Church has disciplined Bishop William Love after Love refused to allow same-sex marriages in his Albany diocese.
- Pakistan’s Supreme Court has ordered the federal and provincial governments to compensate those who suffered losses and property damage during countrywide protests led by different religious groups following Asia Bibi’s acquittal.
- The Little Sisters of the Poor were back in court this past week as Pennsylvania and California challenge their religious exemption from the HHS contraception mandate.
- Members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association spent the weekend cleaning up national parks in California, Florida, and Washington, D.C. as the partial government shutdown continues.
- Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte launched a new tirade against the Catholic Church, denouncing bishops as “sons of bitches” and suggesting that most of them are homosexual.
- The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has reportedly approved thousands of requests by men to bring child and adolescent brides into the country over the past decade, raising questions about whether the immigration system is enabling forced marriage.
- A new Gallup poll finds that only 31 percent of U.S. Catholics rate the honesty and ethical standards of clergy as “very high” or “high,” an 18-percentage-point drop from 2017.