Here are some important law-and-religion news stories from around the web:

• The Fifth Circuit denied the state of Louisiana’s petition for a writ of mandamus to stop short a sweeping challenge to state abortion regulations, but the ruling requires the plaintiffs to establish their legal standing to bring the claims.
• A Muslim employee filed a discrimination complaint against the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles for allegedly denying his repeated requests to attend weekly religious services.
• A U.S. bankruptcy judge approved a $40 million settlement between the Diocese of Duluth (MN) and approximately 125 people who say they were abused as children by priests.
• An Amish family has filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn New York’s state law banning religious exemptions to vaccinations for students, the latest of many lawsuits opposing the new law.
• Archbishop Nunzio Galantino, president of the office that manages the Vatican’s real estate and other assets, is denying the Holy See risks default over its structural deficit, dismissing claims about possible financial ruin.
• Howard William White, Jr., a former Haywood County (NC) Episcopal priest, pleaded guilty to multiple counts of child sexual abuse and was sentenced, principally, to twelve years’ imprisonment.
• A Texas grand jury declined to indict Monsignor Frank Rossi on charges of sexual assault after a Houston business executive alleged that he manipulated her into a sexual relationship while acting as her spiritual advisor.
• A thirty-six-year-old man has pleaded not guilty to charges of robbery and first-degree murder after being accused of beating a pastor to death outside a central Iowa church.