Here are some important law-and-religion news stories from around the web:
- The Supreme Court granted certiorari in Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania, a case involving a Trump administration rule that would grant employers an exemption, on religious or moral grounds, from the ACA’s requirement to provide health insurance coverage for contraceptives.
- This Wednesday the Supreme Court will hear argument in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, a case that asks whether states may subsidize secular private education without also subsidizing religious education.
- The Eighth Circuit heard argument on whether Missouri’s law requiring physicians to give women a pro-life booklet and an ultrasound before conducting an abortion violates the First Amendment.
- The Sixth Circuit reversed a defendant’s conviction for solicitation to commit federal arson of a local mosque, holding that the mosque is not a building used in interstate commerce and is therefore not covered by the federal arson statute.
- A Pakistani court in Rawalpindi sentenced eighty-six members of a radical Islamist party to fifty-five-year prison terms each for taking part in violent rallies in 2018 over the acquittal of Aasia Bibi, a Christian who had been convicted of blasphemy and sentenced to death.
- President Trump unveiled the federal government’s updated guidance on school prayer, which details scenarios in which school officials must permit prayer and clarifies the consequences if they do not.
- A bill was introduced in the Kentucky General Assembly that would replace Bible literacy courses with classes “on the various religious texts of the many religions practiced in the Commonwealth.”
- A review commissioned by the Archdiocese of Anchorage (AK) found credible evidence of sexual misconduct by fourteen people who served in the archdiocese dating to 1966.
ways in which it is influencing China’s future.
apostatized, and during his short reign tried to revive paganism, which, after the conversion to Christianity of his uncle Constantine the Great early in the fourth century, began losing ground at an accelerating pace. Having become an orphan when he was still very young, Julian was taken care of by his cousin Constantius II, one of Constantine’s sons, who permitted him to study rhetoric and philosophy and even made him co-emperor in 355. But the relations between Julian and Constantius were strained from the beginning, and it was only Constantius’ sudden death in 361 which prevented an impending civil war.
Explores the historical origins of Syria’s religious sects and their dominance of the Syrian social scene. It identifies their distinct beliefs and relates how the actions of the religious authorities and political entrepreneurs acting on behalf of their sects expose them to sectarian violence, culminating in the dissolution of the nation-state.