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

  • Bishop James Massa, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Doctrine, responded to Vice President Vance’s recent criticism of Pope Leo XIV’s Palm Sunday Homily, emphasizing that “When Pope Leo XIV speaks as supreme pastor of the universal Church, he is not merely offering opinions on theology, he is preaching the Gospel and exercising his ministry as the Vicar of Christ.”
  • This week, the Justice Department Office of Legal Policy’s Weaponization Working Group published a 37-page report which concluded, in part, that “the Biden DOJ ‘engaged in biased enforcement of the FACE Act’ and ‘pursued more severe charges and significantly harsher sentences for peaceful pro-life defendants than violent pro-abortion defendants.'”
  • In a press release following the final hearing of the President’s Religious Liberty Commission, Chairman Dan Patrick rejected the notion that the First Amendment requires a total separation of church and state.
  • Ohio Attorney General David Yost has filed suit seeking to prevent Hebrew Union College (HUC) from closing its 150-year-old Cincinnati rabbinical school.
  • The Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne and Rosary Hill Home, a hospice care facility in New York, filed suit in a New York federal district court challenging New York’s requirements for care of transgender patients.
  • On April 14th, a settlement was reached between the Coast Guard and three Coast Guard members who had brought a class action after they were denied religious exemptions from the military’s COVID vaccine mandate. Among other things, the Agreement requires the Coast Guard to remove references in personnel records of service members’ decision to remain unvaccinated.
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Around the Web

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

  • Sitting en banc, the 5th Circuit overturned a panel decision declaring a Louisiana law requiring the display of the Ten Commandments in all classrooms of the state’s public schools and universities unconstitutional. The Court reasoned that the dispute was not yet ripe for review.
  • A Woman’s Concern, Inc. v. Healey, (D MA, Feb. 17, 2026) was an action brought by Your Options Medical Centers (YOM), a religiously affiliated pregnancy resource center, wherein they alleged that the state of Massachusetts’ Department of Public Health violated their free speech, free exercise and equal protection rights when it disseminated information critical of pregnancy resource centers. This week, the federal district court for the District of Massachusetts rejected this claim, primarily reasoning that YOM was not targeted for actual or threatened enforcement action.
  • President Trump posted a Presidential Message on Ash Wednesday, calling for all Americans to remember that the Lenten themes of the “prayer, fasting, and almsgiving have been foundational to our strength from the earliest days of our national story.”
  • The Department of Justice announced that it is opening Title IX investigations into three Michigan school districts “to determine whether they have included sexual orientation and gender ideology (SOGI) content in any class for grades pre-K-12.” If the districts are including such content, “the investigations will examine whether the schools have notified parents of their right to opt their children out of such instruction.”
  • The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops released its “Annual Report on the State of Religious Liberty in the United States.” “The report summarizes developments on national questions and federal policies affecting religious liberty in the U.S., including the role of religion in American public life, and the challenges and opportunities of the present moment.”
  • Earlier this month, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas received a draft constitution “that aims to transition the PA to a full-fledged state”. The draft contains a number of provisions on religion and religious freedom.

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Legal Spirits 073: A Short Take on the Minnesota Church Protest

Cities Church (MPR News)

In this episode—the first in a new series of Legal Spirits law-and-religion short takes—Mattone Center Director Mark Movsesian offers an initial assessment of the recent anti-ICE protest at Cities Church in Minnesota. He explains what is known so far, the legal issues the episode raises, and why those issues matter beyond this particular controversy. Whatever the merits of the underlying cause, he argues, intruding into a private worship service infringes a core understanding of the free exercise of religion. Listen in!

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Around the Web

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

  • In Frankel v. Regents of the University of California, the federal government and University of California reached a settlement regarding Anti-Semitism charges.
  • In Jordan v. Rubio, a D.C. federal district court found that the State Department violated RFRA by denying the plaintiff a passport when she refused to provide a birth certificate for religious reasons.
  • In United States v. Safehouse, the 3rd Circuit held that RFRA and the Free Exercise clause apply to corporate entities that exercise religion. 
  • In Kane v. City of New York, petition for certiorari was filed where the 2nd Circuit affirmed denial of religious exemptions for Covid vaccine mandates on public school staff. 
  • Two state tuition assistance programs in Virginia have denied grants to various students pursuing educational programs based on religious training.
  • In Washington, a federal court blocked a law that would require priests to face jail time or break the “seal of confession” regarding reports of abuse. 
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Legal Spirits 068: Religion at the Court: October Term 2024 Recap

In this episode of Legal Spirits, we review the Supreme Court’s major religion cases from the October 2024 Term. From religious charter schools to religious exemptions to parental rights in public education, the Court addressed long-standing issues—and, in one case, made a dramatic move. Join Center Director Mark Movsesian and guest John McGinnis as they unpack the implications of Drummond, Catholic Charities Bureau, and Mahmoud v. Taylor.

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New Paper at SSRN: “Status, Conduct, Belief, and Message”

And, continuing the wedding vendor theme from the last post, my draft paper on the wedding vendor cases, “Status, Conduct, Belief, and Message,” is now available for downloading on the SSRN site. The paper will appear in a forthcoming symposium edition of the Chicago-Kent Law Review. Comments welcome! Here’s the abstract:

This essay explores the constitutional and cultural tensions underlying the “wedding vendor cases,” in which small business owners decline from religious conviction to provide services for same-sex weddings. Litigants often invoke conceptual distinctions among status, conduct, belief, and message, but these distinctions are too indeterminate to resolve the cases in a principled way. The ultimate question is whether LGBT rights should override religious and expressive freedoms in the marketplace. In two recent wedding vendor cases, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, the Court has avoided addressing this fundamental question directly. Instead, the Court has issued narrow rulings based on specific facts and party stipulations, thereby limiting the broader implications of its decisions. While this strategy sacrifices doctrinal clarity and leaves lower courts grappling with uncertainty, it also helps avoid exacerbating cultural polarization on an intensely divisive issue. In the current political climate, incremental case-by-case adjudication—a sort of “passive virtues” approach—may represent a prudent judicial strategy, even if it leaves both sides of the cultural divide dissatisfied.

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Around the Web

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

  • In Anchor Stone Christian Church v. City of Santa Ana, a federal district court in California issued an injunction allowing a church to renovate an office building it acquired. The court held that the city’s denial of a conditional use permit to the church violated RLUIPA and the Free Exercise clause. 
  • An international human rights lawyer urged President Trump to fulfill his campaign promise of facilitating an agreement for the release of Christian Armenian POW’s in Azerbaijan.
  • The Georgia legislature passed the Georgia Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which requires that substantial burdens on the exercise of religion be justified by a compelling interest. A clause was added stating that “granting government funding, benefits, or exemptions” would not violate the act.
  • Kansas governor Laura Kelly vetoed a House Bill which, if passed, would ensure religious liberty for prospective foster families. The bill was designed to prohibit the state from requiring families to accept certain ideological policies which may conflict with their religious beliefs.
  • A federal district court held that two Jewish groups can pursue equal protection and free exercise claims against the University of California, Berkeley, regarding antisemitic treatment.
  • India’s parliament passed a new bill that amends the laws governing Muslim land endowments, allowing non-Muslims to manage the properties (known as waqfs).

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Around the Web

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

  •  In Miller v. McDonald, the Second Circuit held that New York did not violate Amish parents’ Free Exercise rights under the First Amendment when it removed a religious belief exemption from its school immunization law. The court found that the public health law in itself was generally applicable and that there was no evidence that the legislature’s decision to repeal the religious belief exemption in 2019 was motivated by anti-religious sentiment.
  • In CNS International Ministries, Inc. v. Bax, a Missouri federal district court held that a the ministerial exception did not cover a janitor and cafeteria worker at a religious organization that runs residential care facilities for children.
  • Recently, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing to address how to combat antisemitism and antireligious hate crimes in general.
  • A group of Christian Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem have come together to issue a public statement denouncing foreclosure proceedings initiated against the Armenian Patriarchate. The foreclosure proceedings stem from an alleged tax debt levied against the Patriarchate, originating from a municipal tax from which Christian institutions have traditionally been exempt. Christian leaders believe that if the proceedings go unchallenged, it will only lead to more expropriation of Christian assets in Jerusalem.
  • Recently, rebels from an Islamic terrorist group stormed a village in the Congo and took approximately one hundred people hostage. From those taken, seventy bodies were discovered in a Protestant church in Lubero. Sources believe that these hostages were killed when they could no longer continue to march alongside their captors.
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Around the Web

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

  • In Swiech v. Board of Education for the Sylvania City School District, an Ohio state appellate court affirmed the dismissal of a suit brought by an elementary school student’s mother, which claimed that differential bussing violated her free exercise rights.
  • Various Christian and Jewish organizations have sued the Department of Homeland Security in a D.C. federal district court over the rescission of the Sensitive Locations Policy, which limited immigration actions in places of worship.
  • In Zubik v. City of Pittsburgh, a federal district court in Pennsylvania barred the city of Pittsburgh from designating a closed Catholic church as a historic structure.
  • In Higgs v. Farmor’s School, Britain’s Court of Appeals held that the termination of a schoolteacher’s employment due to Facebook posts related to Christian beliefs was a violation of the Equality Act of 2010.  
  • In Calvary Temple Church of Evansville Inc. v. Kirsch, the Indiana Supreme Court provided a broad interpretation of a state statute which partially shields non-profit religious organizations from tort liability.
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Around the Web

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

  • President Donald Trump signed an executive order that established a temporary task force within the Justice Department aimed at eradicating anti-Christian bias within the federal government. The Executive Order names the Attorney General as the Task Force chair and vests within the Task Force with authority to review the activities of all executive departments and agencies for unlawful anti-Christian policies, practices, or conduct, recommend methods to revoke or terminate violative policies, develop strategies to protect the religious liberties of Americans, and more.
  •  In a new complaint filed for Arroyo-Castro v. Gasper, the plaintiff, a public school teacher,  alleges that DiLoreto Elementary & Middle School violated the Free Exercise clause when she was placed on administrative leave following her refusal to remove a crucifix that she had hung among other personal items in personal workspace near her classroom desk. The plaintiff alleges that the school district pressured her in several meetings to remove the crucifix, and suspended her for two days without pay shortly before placing her on administrative leave.
  • In Groveman v. Regents of the University of California, a California District Court recently dismissed a suit alleging that the University of California Davis alleging that the University violated the plaintiff’s First and Fourteenth Amendment rights when it allowed a pro-Palestinian encampment to operate on campus grounds and exclude Plaintiff from walking on the sidewalk where the encampment was located, despite the fact that the encampment violated school policy. The District Court found that the causal connection between the University’s inaction and the injury the plaintiff suffered was too attenuated for a Free Exercise claim to survive. Further, the District Court held that it was impossible to draw a plausible inference that the defendant’s inaction favored or disfavored any religion or burdened the plaintiff’s religious exercise.
  • The Australian Parliament recently passed new amendments to the country’s Hate Crimes Law, strengthening the punishments for existing offenses that urge and force violence and creating new offenses that threaten force or violence against targeted groups and members of groups. These amendments were passed following several high-profile incidents of antisemitism that have risen across the country.
  • The Supreme Court of India recently held that the government of Chhattisgarh has two months to demarcate new, exclusive burial sites for Christians in an attempt to reduce disputes over burial grounds. The Supreme Court’s decision was made against the backdrop of continued persecution by Chhattisgarh state officials, in which Christians have been routinely (and sometimes violently) denied the right to a Christian burial.