News from around the world. Curated by Mark McDowell. Posts do not constitute agreement or endorsement.
Above: South Bay United Pentecostal Church in Chula Vista, May 20, 2020. A Chula Vista church was celebrating a legal victory Saturday after the U.S. Supreme Court granted a partial injunction against California’s prohibition against indoor worship services to help limit the spread of coronavirus. On a 6-3 vote late…
A Peroni float rides by St.Peter and Paul Church during the Italian Heritage parade, in San Francisco, California, on Sunday, Oct. 9, 2016. But by a 6-3 vote , the court ordered California to lift the prohibition on indoor worship that Newsom imposed on nearly all counties in the state.…
A Chula Vista church announced plans to resume indoor worship Sunday after winning a legal victory from the U.S. Supreme Court. On a 6-3 vote late Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court cited the Constitution’s protection of the free exercise of religion. (Renee Schiavone/Patch) SAN DIEGO, CA — A Chula Vista…
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam speaks during an unveiling ceremony for Rumors of War, a statue by artist Kehinde Wiley, at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts on December 10, 2019, in Richmond, Virginia. A judge has dismissed a lawsuit leveled by a church against Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam over previous…
Rice Memorial High School is seen at night. A recent federal appeals court decision regarding a case in Vermont shows the United States Supreme Court is shifting the goalposts of what the Constitution originally deemed precedent, law experts say. Former President Donald Trump appointed a record number of federal judges…
In this May 3, 2020, file photo, the setting sun shines on the Supreme Court building in Washington. As coronavirus cases surge again nationwide, the Supreme Court late Wednesday, Nov. 25, temporarily barred New York from enforcing certain attendance limits at houses of worship in areas designated as hard hit…
National Religious Freedom Day, observed every Jan. 16, is onlyobscurely observed although it officially commemorates the historic day in 1786 when the Virginia Religious Freedom Statute authored by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison separated Virginia and the Anglican Church. They mandated no one “…shall be compelled to frequent or support…
Separation of church and state has been a feature of American democracy for over two centuries. As Thomas Jefferson predicted, that separation has served both the state and organized religion well. The Church of England was the official religion of the colony of Virginia. As the British departed, the bureaucracy…
The United States Supreme Court, in two cases it ruled on together, Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo and Agudath Israel of America v. Cuomo, last month issued an order temporarily barring Governor Cuomo from enforcing strict restrictions on the number of people allowed at houses of worship. In…
WASHINGTON, Dec. 19, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Thousands from around the world will convene in an online rally organized by Right To Believe to call out gross judicial overreach by the DC Courts and denounce the way the DC Court has handled Case 2011 CA 003721 B. Thousands from around the…
WASHINGTON, Dec. 19, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Thousands from around the world will convene in an online rally organized by Right To Believe to call out gross judicial overreach by the DC Courts and denounce the way the DC Court has handled Case 2011 CA 003721 B. "We are rallying today…
Brevard County Commissioner Curt Smith wants to bring invocations back at commission meetings — or at least just before them. Commission meetings haven’t had an invocation since November 2017, as a result of the county being sued in federal court in 2015 by three atheist, agnostic and humanist organizations and…
Are Christmas Carols, Cards, and Greetings at School Constitutional? – By Harold Pease Ph.D. – In the present year of COVID-19 tyrannical governors shut down religious services, a 1st Amendment right, as fast as they could. During the summer months Antifa defaced and with ropes tore down statues of our…
Religious entities given clarity in federal procurement. The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs issued its Final Rule on "Implementing Legal Requirements Regarding the Equal Opportunity Clause’s Religious Exemption." The agency’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on this topic generated heated controversy and more than 109,726 comments. Notwithstanding the strong interest…
Religious entities given clarity in federal procurement. The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs issued its Final Rule on “Implementing Legal Requirements Regarding the Equal Opportunity Clause’s Religious Exemption.” The agency’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on this topic generated heated controversy and more than 109,726 comments. Notwithstanding the strong interest…
On November 17, 2020, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") published a proposed update to its 2008 guidance on religious discrimination in the workplace. The five member commission voted 3-2 to issue the proposed guidance with the two democratic members objecting. The proposed guidance can be accessed here . Although…
In the Nov. 4, 2020 photo, The Supreme Court in Washington. A unanimous Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Muslim men who were placed on the government’s no-fly list because they refused to serve as FBI informants can seek to hold federal agents financially liable. The justices continued a string of…
Rutledge v. Pharmaceutical Care Management Assn. , No. 18-540: Arkansas’ Act 900 regulates the price at which pharmacy benefit managers (“PBMs”) reimburse pharmacies for the cost of drugs covered by prescription-drug plans. Respondent Pharmaceutical Care Management Association is a trade association representing PBMs that brought suit claiming that Act 900…
Just days after the Supreme Court of the United States ruled against New York State’s COVID-19 restrictions on religious services, a Christian school in Kentucky is asking SCOTUS if it can reopen, too. Danville Christian Academy, joined by Kentucky’s Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron , sued the state’s Democratic Governor…
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito flatly rejected a plea by a Louisiana megachurch pastor to keep his church fully open against orders from the government to limit the size of worship gatherings due to the COVID-19 pandemic. That pastor, Tony Spell , whose full legal name is Mark Anthony Spell,…
Landon Coleman is pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Odessa. Reach him at landon@immanuelodessa.com or read his blog at Regular Pastor.com “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right…
Clarence Thomas (Getty) Two Supreme Court justices have suggested that the court needs to “fix” Obergefell v Hodges, the case that made same-sex marriage the law of the land. In October, the court decided not to hear a case involving Kim Davis, the Kentucky clerk who has been sued for…
On May 29, 2020, the Supreme Court denied an injunction in South Bay United Pentecostal Church v. Newsom . The Court’s order was a single sentence. Chief Justice Roberts wrote a solo concurrence that stretched about two pages. According to Westlaw, 114 cases have cited the Chief’s concurrence. (I cited…
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, New York filed a petition for certiorari with the United States Supreme Court on Thursday, requesting an emergency injunction that would block COVID-19 restrictions on in-person church attendance. Though the Supreme Court previously rejected a similar challenge during the earlier stage of the pandemic,…
Getty Images A federal appeals court has ruled against Maine parents challenging a state law that excludes religious schools from the state’s high school tuition program despite a recent ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that struck down similar restrictions in Montana. The U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals on…