During the oral argument, the Court wrestled with whether treating religion differently when it comes to government funding is unlawful discrimination. BJC’s brief noted that declining to fund religious education with taxpayer funds is a long-standing means of ensuring religious liberty.
The rhetoric surrounding the new guidance, which sounded a false alarm about the status of prayer in public school, echoing the claims of Christian nationalism, was far more troubling than the guidance itself.
In January, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case that asks whether a Montana state provision that bars the government from funding religious institutions unconstitutionally discriminates against religion by denying funding to religious institutions that is available to secular institutions.
A proposed Labor Department rule that would allow federal contractors to discriminate in hiring for government-funded positions “is a harmful and unnecessary expansion of the existing religious exemption,” according to BJC in a public comment submitted in opposition earlier this week.
A Juvenile Court judge in Nashville urged Tennessee’s legislature and Governor to reject a bill permitting state-funded, faith-based foster care providers to discriminate on the basis of religion.