Suit Challenges Prayer At School's Teachers Meetings

In Pocola, Oklahoma, a lawsuit has been filed against the superintendent and school board members by Frank Makinson, the school district’s federal program coordinator. The Fort Smith, Arkansas Times-Record reported Friday that the suit challenges the practice of opening the schools' annual teacher and staff meeting with a prayer, led by the high school principal who is also a Baptist minister. Makinson says that his challenge to prayers has led to his being ridiculed and accused of being a Communist. His lawsuit also challenges the opening of school board meetings with an invocation that Makinson says is sectarian.

Rally In Conn. To Oppose Church-State Separation Draws Unwanted Support

Minutemen United, an Ohio-based Christian group, is planning to hold a rally on Tuesday in Danbury, Connecticut, according to last Thursday’s Danbury News-Times. The rally will call for an end to the separation of church and state. Its location was chosen because Thomas Jefferson’s famous reference to “a wall of separation between church and state” is found in his 1802 letter to the Danbury Baptist Association. After a neo-Nazi group, the Grey Wolves, said they would attend the rally, Danbury officials revoked Minutemen United’s permit to hold the rally on Danbury Green and asked them to find private property for the gathering so they can control who attends. Minutemen United says they are opposed to any association with the white supremacist group, according to a second story in the News-Times.

7th Circuit Says Notre Dame Might Need To Repay Government Funds

On Thursday, in a decision written by Judge Richard Posner, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2-1 decision reversed the lower court's dismissal of a taxpayers' Establishment Clause challenge to federal funding of a Catholic teacher training program. The case is Laskowski v. Spellings (7th Cir., April 13, 2006). While the court agreed with the lower court that plaintiffs' petition for an injunction was moot since all the appropriated funds had been spent, it held that there was still the possibility that the court could order the recipient of the funding, Notre Dame University, to repay the funds it received to the federal Treasury if it turns out that the Department of Education unconstitutionally transferred tax money to Notre Dame. Judge Diane Sykes dissented arguing that the plaintiffs never asked for the restitutionary relief that the majority says is possible, and such relief is inconsistent with the cases on taxpayer standing which have never recognized a private party's right to seek repayment to the Treasury as a remedy in Establishment Clause cases. The Chicago Sun Times and the Ft. Wayne News-Sentinel covered the decision.

New Illinois Law Protects Condo Owners' Right To Put Up Mezuzahs

Illinois Governor Rod R. Blagojevich today signed legislation that was designed to guarantee condominium owners the right to observe their religion at home, specifically including the display of objects on their front door. (Press release.) The legislation, S.2165 was prompted by several cases where Chicago co-op boards passed rules banning the display of religious symbols in hallways-- including barring Jewish residents from placing mezuzahs on their doorposts. The bill passed unanimously in both the state House and the Senate. It becomes effective January 1, 2007.

President Extends Passover Greetings

President George W. Bush yesterday issued a statement (full text) extending Passover greetings to all those observing the holiday. The 8-day long Jewish festival begins at sundown tonight. Beginning his statement with a quotation from the Biblical book of Exodus, the President concluded with this wish:

During this celebration of faith and hope, we are reminded that freedom is the Almighty's gift to every man, woman, and child. We pray for a more peaceful and hopeful world where the blessings of liberty are bestowed upon all mankind.

Church Refuses Social Services To Transsexual

A new sort of conflict between non-discrimination rules and faith-based social services has arisen in St. Francis, Minnesota. UPI reported yesterday that the Missouri Synod Trinity Lutheran Church will no longer take clients from Anoka County, Minn. The church refused to serve day-care lunch to a transsexual-- now a woman who had undergone a sex change from her prior identity as a man. The church said the gender change violates its religious beliefs.

Navajo Family's Claim Regarding Autopsy and Cremation Dismissed

The Associated Press reports that a New Mexico federal district court on April 4 dismissed the remaining state free exercise of religion claims in a suit by a Navajo family who accused the state Office of the Medical Investigator of violating tribal religious traditions when it performed an autopsy and then erroneously cremated the body of Abel Taylor. An earlier opinion in the case, Taylor v. Zumwalt, upheld plaintiffs' standing under New Mexico's RFRA statute.

South Carolina Considering Religious Release Time Law

The Charlotte Observer today reports that the state Senate is about to consider a bill that would authorize high schools to provide "release time" for students to attend religious courses. Even without the legislation, 71 schools in South Carolina already offer such programs-- all so far run by Protestant organizations.

Two New Scholarly Articles Online

Here are two new articles recently posted on Bepress:

Jeffrey H. Goldfien, Thou Shalt Love Thy Neighbor: RLUIPA and the Mediation of Religious Land Use Disputes (April 1, 2006).

Maxim Grinberg, Combating Defamation of Religion v. Freedom of Speech: Finding the Balance in a Democratic Society (March 25, 2006).

Serbian Orthodox Face Problems In Macedonia

The Christian Science Monitor yesterday reported on the severe problems faced by the the Serbian Orthodox Church in Macedonia. Its followers meet in secrecy in Skopje. The Macedonian chapter of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights filed a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights last month after Macedonia's highest court upheld a law barring the Serbian Orthodox Church from functioning in Macedonia. The dispute centers around controversial Archbishop Jovan Vraniskovski who broke with the Macedonian Orthodox Church in July 2002. He has previously been jailed for his religious activities, but is also charged with financial misconduct from 2001 and 2002 when he was still affiliated with the Macedonian Orthodox Church. (See prior related posting.)

Recent Prisoner Cases Include Claims By Man Arrested For Suspicion Of 9/11 Involvement

The opinion in Omar v. Casterline, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 17302 (WD La., Feb. 8, 2006), has just become available. It involves an arrest made in the immediate wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the U.S. Hady Hassan Omar was taken into custody, suspected of being linked to the 9/11 plot because he had purchased an airline ticket for the morning of 9/11 from the same internet account as two of the known hijackers. Omar was questioned by the FBI and after a few days' custody in Arkansas was transferred to the United States Penitentiary at Pollock, Louisiana where he was held until Nov. 23, 2001. He claims that during his detention at Pollock, his free exercise rights were infringed. His charges relate to being served pork, or being served pork substitute without being told it was a substitute; to inteferences with his observance of Ramadan, including being given the wrong date for its commencement; and to mocking of his religion by prison officials. All the claims were dismissed, either on grounds of qualified immunity or de minimis interference with Free Exercise rights. The court held that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act has no impact on the claims because it only deals with challenges to neutral laws of general applicability.

In an unrelated prisoner free-exercise decision recently released, Blount v. Johnson, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 17300 (WD Va., Feb. 14, 2006), a Virginia federal district court rather summarily dismissed a challenge to state prison grooming rules on the basis of 4th Circuit precedent.

Title VII Suit Seeks Relief From Biometric Fingerprinting

The Columbia Missourian on Sunday covered an unusual Title VII employment discrimination case brought by a fundamentalist Christian who was fired after he refused to use a time clock that is triggered by his biometric fingerprint. Donny Attaway, a member of New Covenant Faith Center in Independence, Missouri, believes that fingerprinting could be the "mark of the beast" warned against in the New Testament Book of Revelation. The Alliance Defense Fund attorney defending Attaway admits that this is an unusual interpretation of the Biblical passages. Many others believe that the mark of the beast is the number 666, or rely on the passages from Revelation to oppose using a Social Security number for identification. The suit claims that Attaway's employer, QuickTrip, should accommodate Attaway's religious beliefs by permitting him to use his Social Security code at work, as is done for employees with broken fingers.

Interdisciplinary Journal of Research On Religion

I have learned of a fairly new journal that is published online-- The Interdisciplinary Journal of Research On Religion. New articles appear as they are accepted. The two most recent are:

Marie A. Eisenstein, Religious Motivation vs. Traditional Religiousness: Bridging the Gap Between Religion and Politics and the Psychology of Religion

Brian J. Grim and Roger Finke, International Religion Indexes: Government Regulation, Government Favoritism, and Social Regulation of Religion

[Thanks to Pasquale Annicchino for the information.]

Church Wins RLUIPA Land Use Case

Mintz v. Roman Catholic Bishop, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 17255 (D. Mass., March 30, 2006), involves a RLUIPA religious land-use claim is a different procedural posture than usual. The Lennox, Massachusetts Zoning Board of Appeals issued a building permit to St. Ann's Parish, even though the proposed parish center violated the setback and coverage requirements of the town's zoning bylaws. It did so after town counsel advised the Board that refusal to issue the permit would violate RLUIPA. Neighboring property owners sued to challenge the Board's decision. Now a Massachusetts federal district court has upheld the zoning board's decision, and along the way affirmed the constitutionality of RLUIPA's land use provisions.

Christian Coalition Faces Financial Distress

Yesterday's Washington Post reports that the once politically powerful Christian coalition has fallen on hard financial times. While it once employed a dozen Capitol Hill lobbyists, now it has only one Washington employee who works out of his home. The departure of Pat Robertson after a controversial CNN interview defending China's one-child policy, the departure of Ralph Reed to become a political consultant, and battles over the group's tax status because of its voters' guides all had an impact on the Coalition's fund-raising ability.

White House Easter Egg Roll Politicized This Year

On April 17 [corrected date] the annual White House Easter Egg Roll is being held on the South Lawn of the White House. (White House announcement.) In connection with it, the White House has posted online an "Easter Word Search"puzzle-- no religious terms used in it.

However, this year the event is likely to be more politicized than usual. Some 200 gay families, organized by the National Pride Coalition, will be attending. The White House event is open to anyone who stands in line early enough to get tickets, so long as the person is part of a group with no more than 2 adults and with at least one child under 8. The NPC plans, aimed at introducing gay families as "real" families to the President and the public, are disussed in the International Herald Tribune, by Gay.com and by the Scripps-Howard News Service. Andrea Lafferty, executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition complained: "For crying out loud, at the Easter Egg roll? This is a family event." She called the plans "very distasteful", saying it was inappropriate to politicize the egg roll and to use children to do so. However, Peter Watkins, deputy press secretary to Laura Bush, who is in charge of the egg roll, said: "It's an event that has a great tradition and all families are welcome to attend."

British Court Rules Sham Marriage Law Creates Religious Discrimination

BBC News today reports that Britain's High Court has ruled a law intended to prevent sham marriages by immigrants desiring to stay in the UK is invalid because it discriminates on the basis of religion. The 2005 law requires most immigrants who are in Britain temporarily to obtain permission from the Home Office to marry. However, there is an exception for those who marry in the Church of England. The court found that there was "no adequate justification" for the marriage regulations to be used to control immigration, and held that the rules are incompatible with human rights law because those marrying within the Church of England are not subject to the same approval requirements as those wed civilly or in another faith. The government had argued that there was no evidence of sham schemes involving the Church of England. The judge has granted the government permission to appeal the decision.

Fundamentalist Christian Campaign Against Tolerance Policies Protecting Gays

The Los Angeles Times this morning carries an article detailing the broader campaign behind the lawsuit filed last month by the Alliance Defense Fund challenging the speech code and tolerance policies at Georgia Institute of Technology. The suit is part of a move to force public schools and colleges, as well as private employers, to eliminate policies protecting gays and lesbians from harassment on the ground that such policies interfere with the religious rights of conservative Christians who wish to denounce homosexuality as a sinful lifestyle. Evangelist Rev. Rick Scarborough frames the issue as defending the right to be Christian, and calls it the civil rights struggle of the 21st century.

Recent Scholarly Articles of Interest

From Bepress:
Adam E. Lyons, Here Is the Church, Now Who Owns the Steeple? A Revised Approach to Church Property Disputes (March 20, 2006).

From SSRN:

• Thomas Berg, The Permissible Scope of Limitations on the Freedom of Religion and Belief in the United States, 19 Emory Journal of International Law 1277 (2005).
• Marc O. Degirolami, Recoiling From Religion, forthcoming in San Diego Law Review.
  

From SmartCILP:

• Jason Daniel Medinger, The Holy See, Historicity, and Humanitarian Intervention: Using Integrative Jurisprudence To Inform Contemporary Practice, 41 Texas International Law Jour. 39-66 (2006).
• Jeremy Patrick-Justice, Strict Scrutiny for Denominational Preferences: Larson In Retrospect, 8 New York City Law Review 53-121 (2005).
  

President Speaks At National Catholic Prayer Breakfast

Last Friday, President George W. Bush spoke (text of remarks) at the 3rd Annual National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. The breakfast, promoted as an "annual event ... created in 2004 in response to beloved Pope John Paul II's appeal for a 'New Evangelization' ... to spread the Word of the Gospel", the event attracted numerous federal officials. In his remarks, the President acknowledged the presence of Chief Justice John Roberts, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson (a former ambassador to the Vatican), and Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum. The President used the occasion to promote immigration reform, just hours before an announced Senate compromise on the immigration bill fell apart. Bush also spoke of freedom around the world, remarks lauded in a post by Rick Garnett at Mirror of Justice.