The U.S. Supreme Court today denied review in Trustees of New Life In Christ Church v. City of Fredericksburg, Virginia, (certiorari denied, 1/18/2022), over the dissenting opinion of Justice Gorsuch. In the case, a Virginia state court denied the state's "ministerial residence" tax exemption to a local Presbyterian church because the Youth Ministers living in the home at issue were not ordained clergy and were not listed by the church as one of its primary pastors. (See prior related posting.) The city claimed that this meant they did not qualify as "ministers" under the Presbyterian Church's Book of Church Order, despite the local church's insistence that they do qualify. Justice Gorsuch, in his opinion dissenting from the denial of certiorari, said in part:
[T]he City continues to insist that a church’s religious rules are “subject to verification” by government officials....
I would grant the petition and summarily reverse. The First Amendment does not permit bureaucrats or judges to “subject” religious beliefs “to verification.”...
This case may be a small one, and one can hope that the error here is so obvious it is unlikely to be repeated anytime soon. But I would correct it....
Courthouse News Service reports on the case.
