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The two sides squaring off over public funding for a Catholic charter school in Oklahoma have lawyered up. Already, 27 attorneys from six states and Washington, D.C., have signed on for the battle , which is in Oklahoma County now but may ultimately head to the U.S. Supreme Court. Several of the attorneys represent national groups that have been fighting in courts for decades over church-state issues. The Oklahoma case offers them a chance to test the question of whether a publicly funded Christian school would be an arm of the state — a “state actor,” in the legal parlance. The answer could have impacts well beyond Oklahoma’s borders. The case also thrusts St. Isidore, the virtual charter school envisioned by the Archdioceses of Oklahoma City and Tulsa, into the overlapping national debates about politics, culture and education. “Charter schools are public schools and they must welcome and serve all students,” said Jessica Levin, acting litigation director for the Education Law Center, one of the groups whose attorneys are fighting against the use of taxpayer money for the Catholic school. “But St. Isidore plans to discriminate based on characteristics such as religion and sexual orientation and has not shown […]