Three churches and their pastors filed suit this week in a Minnesota federal district court challenging the state's COVID-19 limits on worship services. The complaint (full text) in Cornerstone Church of Alexandria v. Walz, (D MN, filed 8/13/2020), alleges in part:
The plaintiffs’ religious liberties under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution have been violated by Governor Walz’s Executive Orders 20-74 and 20-81. Although during a pandemic, the ordinary constitutional test of strict scrutiny may not apply to the Governor’s regulation of church activities (although it is still argued here in Count I), the government’s regulations must still be “capable of a reasoned application” as they would be for a non-public forum....
Thomas More Society issued a press release announcing the filing of the lawsuit.
