U.S. Olympic Coach Proselytizes His Archer-Athletes

Today's New York Times reports that the proselytizing of athletes by Kisk Lee, head coach of the U.S. Olympic archery team, concerns the U.S. Olympic Committee. At least three of the five members of the U.S. archery team in Beijing meet with Lee each morning to sing hymns, read from the Bible and attend services at the chapel in Olympic Village. Lee, who became a Christian in 1999, says: "I don’t want to have any favorites. I would love to be fair for everyone. But sooner or later, if they can see through me God, that’s what I want to try to do." Lee says that Christianity helps athletes clear their minds and focus. A Colorado mother who is a Buddhist expressed concern about the pressures her 16-year old daughter felt to accept Christianity when she trained with Lee at the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, Calif.

McCain Urged Not To Use Religious Test For Veep Choice

Former Minnesota Governor Arne Carlson wrote John McCain last Saturday asking him not to rule out vice-presidential picks on the basis of their religion. Monday's St. Paul Pioneer Press reported that Carlson seems particularly concerned about evangelical opposition to Mormon Mitt Romney. He wrote: "If a Mormon cannot be considered today for high office, who will be eliminated from the same consideration tomorrow? If a segment of a broad religion can impose its religious criteria on a presidential candidate and the Republican Party, then what other challenges to the Constitution can they make?"

Egyptian Proposal On Organ Donation Seen By Some As Religious Discrimination

In Egypt, a proposed law regulating organ donation has become controversial. Spero News yesterday, and Daily News Egypt on Monday, reported on the proposal that would allow organ donations only to family members (up to the fourth degree). It would also ban organ transplants between individuals of different religions or different nationalities. Proponents say the law is aimed at stopping the current black market in human organs, particularly sales by the poor to wealthy Egyptians or to foreigners who travel to the country. The Egyptian Human Rights Union, however, has sued the Egyptian Medical Association claiming that the proposed law amounts to religious discrimination between Muslims and Christians, and could eventually lead to religiously segregated hospitals. For now, the proposed law is stalled because of objections from some Muslim religious leaders who do not recognize brain death as the test for the end of life-- a test that is necessary if organs are to be obtained while still usable.

New Jersey School Issue Vote Postponed Because of Holy Day Conflict

The Edison, New Jersey, Public School District is seeking voter approval for the issuance of $57.8 million in bonds to construct a new school building and expand three others. New Jersey law provides only four specific dates on which special elections on such issues can be held. Originally the Board of Education decided to place the issue on the ballot on the first available date-- Sept. 30. However this year that day is Rosh Hashana, and that meant that observant Jews would need to vote by absentee ballot. Yesterday's New Jersey Jewish News reports that the scheduling conflict created a firestorm of protest from a number of Jewish groups. In a letter to school officials, several groups argued that the absentee ballot alternative effectively created "a separate and more cumbersome voting procedure for a whole group of Edison residents based solely on their religion." Edison has now agreed to reschedule the vote for December 9, but Board of Education vice president Joseph Romano says that even if the measure passes, waiting until winter means an additional several months of weather delays before construction can begin.

Free Exercise and Vagueness Defenses Raised In Charges Over Death of Child

In Wausau,Wisconsin, according to WISN News, a couple charged with reckless homicide plead not guilty yesterday and are raising constitutional defenses. Dale and Leilani Neumann merely prayed for the recovery of their 11-year old daughter, Kara, after she suffered a diabetic reaction. She died 48 hours after symptoms became severe. A motion seeking dismissal of the indictment argues that the charges unconstitutionally infringe the couple's free exercise rights and their liberty interest in rearing their children. The motion also argues that the law is unconstitutionally vague. Wisconsin law provides that a parent cannot be charged with abuse or neglect of a child if in good faith the parent selects prayer as treatment for a disease. The prosecutor argues that the statute does not apply to homicide cases. (See prior related posting.)

Israel's Army Pursues Refunds From Officers Using False Rabbinic Ordinations

YNet News reported Monday that Israel's army is demanding that some 300 career and enlisted IDF officers repay the $560 (US) per month pay increases they have been receiving after claiming to have been ordained as rabbis. It turns out that their ordinations were fraudulent, having either been purchased from rabbinical schools without meeting the ordination requirements, or having been granted by institutions that are not qualified to certify rabbis at all. Military Police have been investigating the false ordinations for two years. [Thanks to Religion & State In Israel for the lead.]

Settlement Reached In Christian High School Group's Equal Access Claim

Alliance Defense Fund announced Friday that it had reached a settlement in a federal lawsuit filed earlier this year against the Deer Valley, Arizona Unified School District. (See prior posting.) The settlement will allow a Christian student group, Common Cause, to present video announcements of the group's activities, including a weekly morning prayer gathering, through Mountain Ridge High School's public address system and through distribution of leaflets on campus, on the same basis as non-religious groups are permitted to do so. In May, a federal district court in Krestan v. Deer Valley Unified School District, (D AZ, May 9, 2008), issued a preliminary injunction against the school, finding that plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the merits of their claim under the federal Equal Access Act as to the announcements which the school had previously refused to disseminate. The court found that the school's policy of limiting the days on which leaflets could be distributed by any student group was likely valid.

Is Religion An Element In the Georgia-Russia Conflict?

A posting on Reuters FaithWorld blog yesterday raises the question of whether religion is an element in the current conflict between Russia and Georgia. The issue was focused after Sen. John McCain, in discussing the conflict, stressed Georgia's long-standing Christian heritage. Reuters argues that both Russia and Georgia share Christian Orthodoxy, though:

since Orthodox churches are organised nationally, each side naturally reflects in some way its own country’s political view of the crisis. But even in his protest letter to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, [Georgian Patriarch] Ilia’s only reference to religion was his lament that Orthodox were killing each other.

New "Blogalogue" Offers Church-State Debate Between Two Opposing Experts

Beliefnet has launched an interesting new resource on church-state issues-- a blog titled Lynn v. Sekulow-- Politics, Religion and the Public Square. The blog is described as "an ongoing debate blog--a blogalogue--about how big (or little) a role faith and religion should play in American politics and government." The debaters are Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Executive Director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel for the American Center for Law & Justice. A link to the new site has been added to the Religion Clause sidebar under "Blogs".

Religious Cult Members Charged In Boy's Death

The AP reported yesterday on murder charges that have been brought against five members of a cult known as the "1 Mind Ministries". One-year old Javon Thompson died after being denied food and water for two days because he would not say "Amen" after meals. After the boy's death, the cult leader, Queen Antoinette, told her followers to pray for the boy's resurrection from the dead. One of those charged with murder is the boy's mother, Ria Ramkissoon. Her attorney, as well as her own mother, say she was brainwashed by the cult's leaders.

Informational Meeting On Hamptons Eruv Turns Contentious

Hamptons Online yesterday reported at length on a contentious public information session held last Wednesday in Westhampton Beach, New York regarding a request by a local synagogue to construct an eruv-- a symbolic boundary that permits Orthodox Jews to carry items on the Sabbath. One-third of the large crowd at the meeting held in The Hampton Synagogue walked out when one of the panelists, Joel Cohen, began reading anti-Semitic e-mails that the synagogue had received over the matter. This however reflected more pervasive tensions over the proposal. Some opponents fear that creating the eruv will attract more Orthodox Jews to the area and turn the town into a religious enclave. (See prior related posting.)

CA High Court: Doctors Cannot Assert Free Exercise In Refusing IUI Treatment For Lesbian

Today in North Coast Women's Care Medical Group, Inc. v. San Diego County Superior Court, (CA Sup. Ct., Aug. 18, 2008), the California Supreme Court held unanimously that a medical clinic's physicians are prohibited by the Unruh Civil Rights Act from discriminating against patients on the basis of sexual orientation. They may not rely on the free exercise provisions of the U.S. or California constitutions to assert an exemption from that prohibition.

In the case, two clinic physicians refused, on religious grounds, to perform intrauterine insemination for Guadalupe Benitez, an unmarried lesbian patient. The court held that under the 1st Amendment, no religious exemption is mandated because the Unruh Civil Rights Act is a neutral law of general application. The court said it need not decide whether the California constitution imposes greater protection for religious beliefs, because even under a strict scrutiny standard defendants' assertion fails. Since the Unruh Civil Rights Act requires merely "full and equal" access, the physicians could either refuse to perform the procedure for any clinical patients, or refer patients to other physicians employed by the clinic who do not have the same religious objections. The court said that defendants are still free at trial to prove that their religious objections related to the fact that Benitez was unmarried, rather than the fact she was a lesbian.

Justice Baxter concurred, but argued that the balance of competing interests might come out differently in the case of a physician in sole practice. He said: "At least where the patient could be referred with relative ease and convenience to another practice, I question whether the state’s interest in full and equal medical treatment would compel a physician in sole practice to provide a treatment to which he or she has sincere religious objections." The San Diego Union Tribune reports on the decision. (See prior related posting.)

US Group Refuses To Leave Chinese Airport After Bibles Seized

Chinese law prohibits bringing printed religious material into the country except for personal use. CNN today reports that four members of the Sheridan, Wyoming based Christian group, Vision Beyond Borders, are refusing to leave the Kunming Airport after customs officials seized 300 Bibles that they had in their luggage that were to be distributed through a Kunming shop owner. The group's director, Pat Klein, said he has been bringing Bibles into China for 21 years, and did not know he was violating Chinese law. He says they will stay at the airport until their Bibles are returned to them.

UPDATE: Unable to get the Chinese to relent, members of Vision Beyond Borders left the Kunming Airport on Monday after 26 hours. (AP).

UPDATE: When members of Vision Beyond Borders returned to the Kunming airport to leave China on Wednesday for Thailand, their 315 Bibles were returned to them and they were escorted to immigration. (China Post, Aug. 20).

Recent Scholarly Articles and Book of Interest

From SSRN:

• Christopher C. Lund, The Congressional Chaplaincies (August 14, 2008).
• Benjamin M Leff, Sit Down and Count the Cost: A Framework for Constitutionally Enforcing the 501(C)(3) Campaign Intervention Ban, (August 12, 2008).

From SmartCILP:

• Conversation in Aid of a "Conspiracy" for Truth: A Candid Discussion About Jesuit Law Schools, Justice, and Engaging the Catholic Intellectual Tradition. Article by Gregory A. Kalscheur; responses by C. Michael Bryce, Thomas More Donnelly and student Spencer K. Nussbaum; reply by John M. Breen. 43 Gonzaga Law Review 559-669 (2007/08).
• Financial Innovations in the Muslim World. Articles by Bjorn Sorenson, Ali Adnan Ibrahim, Umar F. Moghul, Bashar H. Malkawi and Haitham A. Haloush. 23 American University International Law Review 647-805 (2008).
• Vols. 6 (2006-07 and Vol. 7 (2007-08)of the UCLA Journal of Near Eastern and Islamic Law [contents] have recently been published.

New Book:

• Religion & Law in America: An Encyclopedic Dictionary, (Grey House Publishing, Oct. 2008).

Paper Says 1953 Raid Was Precursor To FLDS Operation

Saturday's Arizona Republic carries a lengthy history of the raid 55 years ago on a polygamous community in Short Creek Arizona. The article suggests that the recent Texas raid on the FLDS Yearning for Zion Ranch has many parallels to the 1953 Arizona raid. The Arizona raid ultimately reinforced the convictions of members of the polygamous community.

Recent Prisoner Free Excercise Cases

In Massi v. Hollenbach, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 60463 (MD PA, Aug. 1, 2008), a Pennsylvania federal district court judge accepted a magistrate's recommendation and rejected a prisoner's challenge to regulations requiring that prisoners obtain religious publications from a publisher, book club, or book store unless it is shown that a publication is no longer available from such a source.

In Logan v. Arkansas Department of Corrections, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61809 (ED AR, July 28, 2008), an Arkansas federal magistrate judge recommended dismissal of a challenge by a Wiccan prisoner to Arkansas hair length requirements for prisoners.

In Rankins v. Smith, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61411, (ED NC, Aug. 7, 2008), a North Carolina federal district court dismissed for failure to exhaust administrative remedies a prisoner's claim that a prison officer retaliated against him for filing a complaint about medical treatment by failing to put his name on the Ramadan list and not allowing him to receive foods from the Eid-ul-Fitr feast.

Pugh v. Goord, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 60998 (SD NY, Aug. 1, 2008), is a lengthy opinion involving challenges by Shi'te Muslim inmates to New York's policy that provides for a single Friday Jumah service for both Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims, instead of allowing a separate Shi'ite service. Shi'ite prisoners also allege other anti-Shi'ite elements in the prison's program to accommodate their religious needs, making it, they say, a Sunni, not a generic Muslim, program. While rejecting damage claims, the court permitted some of the plaintiffs to move ahead with injunctive claims under the free exercise clause, establishment clause, equal protection clause and RLUIPA.

Scotland Agrees With Catholic Church On Content of Health Leaflets In Schools

Scotland on Sunday reports today that Scottish government officials will shortly begin a program to offer all school girls age 12 and 13 vaccination against cervical cancer caused by certain strains of HPV. However, against the advice of many health experts, the leaflet that will be distributed to those receiving the inoculation will not contain information on the use of condoms to prevent other sexually transmitted diseases. The decision was made in order to obtain support from the Catholic Church for offering the vaccinations in Catholic schools. The Church had originally objected to the vaccination program on the ground that it would encourage promiscuity. [Thanks to Edward Still for the lead.]

Study Lists Countries That Bar Foreign Religious Workers

WorldNet Daily reported Friday that a study from a researcher at the Library of Congress shows that 23 countries around the world deny entry to foreign religious workers, while an additional 16 allow entry only with restrictions. Almost all the countries on the "total ban" list are countries with majority Muslim populations.

TN High Court Says Cult Leader May Be In Loco Parentis Under Child Neglect Law

In State of Tennessee v. Sherman, (TN Sup. Ct., Aug. 15, 2008), the Tennessee Supreme Court refused to dismiss charges under Tennessee's child neglect statute against a religious cult leader in the death of Jessica Crank, a teenage girl whose mother opted for prayer instead of medical treatment for her daughter's bone cancer. Ariel Ben Sherman, a minister in the Universal Life Church, was not married to the girl's mother nor had he adopted the girl. However the mother and daughter lived with him, as did several of his other followers. Prosecutors claimed that Sherman had an in loco parentis duty to seek treatment for Jessica. The court held: "The Defendant's relationship with the mother may be circumstantial evidence of duty, but the ultimate question is the nature and degree of the Defendant’s relationship with Jessica. In theory, the State might be able to establish that the Defendant failed to perform a statutory duty to provide adequate medical care for the child." Yesterday's Knoxville News-Sentinel reported on the decision. (See prior related posting.)

County Fair Widens God and Country Day Discount

After complaints by an atheist group (see prior posting) about the "God and Country" day promotion planned by the Wilson County, Tennessee fair, promoters have responded. Instead of giving a $2 admission discount only to individuals who present a church bulletin at the gate, now the discount will be available to anyone presenting a bulletin from any faith's religious services, or anyone presenting a web page printout from any religious or secular group. Friday's Tennessean reported that Cheryl Lewis, member of the Wilson County Promotions Board, said that God and Country day was not discriminatory, and was begun in 2002 as a response to the 9-11 attacks. [Thanks to Scott Mange for the lead.]