Supreme Court Hears Oral Arguments In ERISA "Church Plan" Cases

The U.S. Supreme Court today heard consolidated oral arguments in three cases raising the question of when pension plans of religiously affiliated health care systems qualify for the "church plan" exemption under ERISA.  The three cases are Advocate Health Care v. Stapleton, St. Peter's Health Care v. Kaplan and Dignity Health v. Rollins. The full transcript of the oral arguments are available from the Supreme court's website.  A fuller explanation of the issues involved is set out in this prior posting.  AP reports on the arguments. Huge dollar amounts of potential underfunding are at stake nationwide.