Egyptian Court Dismisses Blasphemy Suit For Plaintiff's Lack of Standing

In Egypt yesterday, a court dismissed a second lawsuit charging businessman Naguib Sawiris with blasphemy for a cartoon of Mickey Mouse with a beard and Minnie Mouse in a veil which he tweeted last June. The court ruled that Ali Dergham, the conservative Salafi lawyer who brought the suit, lacked standing because he was not injured. The court sent the case to the prosecutor's office for further investigation. AP's report on the case reviews the rise in blasphemy cases filed by Salafi lawyers in recent months as their Al-Nour party has become the second most powerful in Egypt's new parliament. Last week a court dismissed another similar case against Sawiris on the same ground. (See prior posting.)

Suit Filed Over Library's Room Use Policy

The religious education and advocacy organization, Liberty Counsel, last month filed a federal lawsuit against the Seaside, Oregon public library after being denied use of a library meeting room for a planned program on educating children from a Biblical perspective.  The complaint (full text) in Liberty Counsel, Inc. v. Seaside Public Library Board of Trustees, (D OR, filed 2/9/2012), alleges that the library's room-use policy violates the 1st Amendment's free expression and establishment clauses, as well as the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. Under the library's rules, rooms are available for non-profit groups to use, but use for religious services or proselytizing is not permitted. The Astoria (OR) Daily Astorian reports on the lawsuit.

Pennsylvania Church Loses Zoning Challenge

In First Korean Church of New York v. Cheltenham Township Zoning Hearing Board, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 25968 (ED PA, Feb. 29, 2012), a Pennsylvania federal district court granted summary judgment to defendants in a lawsuit by First Korean Church that had been prevented by township zoning ordinances from using a 33.8 acre property for a church and seminary. The property, purchased by the church at a sheriff's sale, formerly housed another seminary. Plaintiff argues that a series of zoning actions and amendments since 1998 violated RLUIPA as well as the 1st and 14th Amendments. The court disagreed.

2nd Circuit Blinks In Bronx Household of Faith Temporary Injunction

In the battle between the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals and New York federal district judge Loretta Preska over the scope of a preliminary injunction in Bronx Household of Faith v. Board of Education of the City of New York, it appears that the Second Circuit has blinked.  As previously reported, Judge Preska defied the Second Circuit and on Feb. 24 extended to all schools her temporary injunction against enforcement of a New York rule barring churches from using school buildings after hours for worship services. The Second Circuit had said the temporary injunction should extend only to Bronx Household of Faith's use of a school building. The New York Law Journal reports that on Feb. 29, the Second Circuit refused the schools' request to stay Judge Preska's Feb 24 injunction. However the Second Circuit asked Judge Preska to hand down an opinion in the case by mid-June so that the dispute can be resolved by the start of school in the Fall. On that basis, the Second Circuit said that while the harm suffered by the schools "is real and significant," it "consists only in the continuation for the short balance of this school year of a status quo that has been in effect for almost a decade." AP reports on the latest developments.

"Jesus Christ Superstar" Cancelled In Belarus

The Christian Post and RIA Novosti report that further performances of Andrew Lloyd Webber's rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar have been cancelled in Belarus. A tour of the show in the country was scheduled by the St.Petersburg-based theater Rock Opera. The tour began in Brest, but opposition by leaders of the Orthodox Church and outraged audiences who saw the show as blasphemous led to performances being cancelled in Gomel, Mogilyov, and Minsk. [corrected]. It is unclear whether the government ordered the cancellations, or whether Rock Opera decided on its own to cancel it to avoid further strife. Apparently the faithful were particularly offended by a performance scheduled for the first day of Lent.

Pakistan Arrests Men Who Assaulted Woman Charged With Apostasy

Today's Pakistan Express Tribune reports that in the northeastern Pakistani city of Gujranwala, some 25 men have been arrested for assaulting a woman-- identified as Sana-- whom they accused of apostasy. Sana had converted from Christianity to Islam six months ago and had moved to the village with her two sons. However villagers accused her of still seeing her Christian husband. Sana denies that allegation and says that the villagers were stirred up by one of her attackers whose proposal of marriage she had turned down. The men who attacked her, shaved her head, required her to put on a garland made of shoes and paraded her through the village. The men will appear in an anti-terrorism court in Gujranwala today, charged with violating Sec. 354 of the Pakistan Penal Code (Assault to a woman with intent to outrage her modesty) and Sec. 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act.

2012 White House Easter Egg Roll Announced; Lottery For Tickets Opens

The White House announced yesterday that the134th annual White House Easter Egg Roll will be held on April 9.  This year's theme is "Let's Go, Let's Play, Let's Move." Starting yesterday and until March 5, children 13 years old and younger, along with their families, can enter an online lottery through which tickets to attend will be distributed. Elementary and Middle School students are also invited to enter a poster contest for the 2012 Easter Egg Roll.

Senate Tables Proposed Broad Conscience Exemption To Required Health Care Coverage

The Washington Post reports that the Senate today tabled-- and thus effectively killed-- a proposed amendment (full text) to a federal highway bill offered by Sen. Toy Blunt (R-Mo) that would have provided a broad conscience exemption from any otherwise required coverage by health insurance plans under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The exemption would not have been limited to religiously affiliated organizations. The vote to table was 51-48, largely along party lines. However one Republican voted to table, while 3 Democrats voted against the motion to table.

Egyptian Court Sentences Christian For Insulting Prophet; Separate Case Dismissed

BikyaMasr reports today that a court in the southern Egyptian province of Assiut has sentenced Makram Diab, a Christian, to 6 years in prison for showing contempt of religion and insulting the Prophet Muhammad. Diab, a school employee, made remarks that infuriated his Muslim co-workers who went on strike until he was arrested and prosecuted.  Earlier this week, according to AP, a court in Cairo threw out a lawsuit against telecommunications mogul Naguib Sawiris, also a Christian, who angered Muslims by sending out via Twitter a cartoon showing Mickey Mouse in a beard and Minnie Mouse in a veil. (See prior posting.) The court held that plaintiffs were not eligible to bring a religious defamation lawsuit. But two other suits against Sawiris based on the same cartoons are still pending in Egyptian courts.

Scottish Court Limits Conscientious Objections Of Midwives

A Scottish court has rejected the claim by two midwives employed at Glasgow's Southern General Hospital that because of their conscientious objection they should not be required to delegate to, supervise or support staff on the labor ward who are directly involved with patients undergoing termination of pregnancy. In In re Petition of Doogan, (CSOH, Feb. 29, 2012), the Court of Session (Outer House) held that the conscientious objection provisions of the Abortion Act 1967 only excuse medical personnel from participating in the treatment of a patient, not from activities further removed than that.The court also rejected petitioners' claim that the Human Rights Act 1998 protects them. The court held: "Here, the petitioners are being protected from having any direct involvement with the procedure to which they object. Nothing they have to do as part of their duties terminates a woman's pregnancy. They are sufficiently removed from direct involvement as, it seems to me, to afford appropriate respect for and accommodation of their beliefs." Today's Scotsman reports on the decision.

Democratic-Leaning Catholic Group Issues 2012 Voter Guide

Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good-- described by USA Today as a group of Democratic-leaning Catholics-- yesterday released its 2012 Voter Guide. The Guide says in part:

In our country, a long series of social and political achievements give testimony to the thirst for justice and human dignity that are at the core of the Church’s social teaching....

Sadly, in America today, our nation’s political, social and economic debate has been assaulted in recent years by a different understanding of the human vocation, one in which there is no room for Christ and no room for Christian love. This different understanding, exemplified by the Tea Party, is rooted in explicitly anti-Christian teachings, it celebrates a hyper-individualism that specifically denies the possibility of a Common Good, and is dedicated to a form of social Darwinism in which the poor and vulnerable are despised and only the achievements and wealth of the strong merit political protection. In order to protect exorbitant tax cuts for the super-rich, some advocate terminating social programs that promote the poor and middle class, both at home and abroad, often in ways that are profoundly anti-life. Many have sought to deny the basic rights of workers to organize and collectively bargain. In the strongest possible terms, we denounce this new ideology as un-Christian, un-Catholic, and, indeed, as a perversion of America’s own best traditions.

Another House Committee Holds Hearings On Contraceptive Coverage Mandate

Another House committee has held hearings on the Obama administration's contraceptive mandate.  On Tuesday, the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing titled Executive Overreach: The HHS Mandate Versus Religious Liberty. The statements of the committee chairman, and of the four witnesses appearing before the committee are posted on the Judiciary Committee's website. Witnesses were Bishop William Lori; Asma Uddin from the Becket Fund; Dr. Linda Rosenstock, Dean of UCLA's School of Public Health; and Jeanne Monahan of the Family Research Council. In his opening statement, Committee Chairman Lamar Smith said in part: "The HHS mandate is a clear violation of religious freedom and a direct attack on the personally held views of many Americans. It is an erosion of religious freedoms." In mid-February, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing on the same issue. (See prior posting.) Life News reports on Tuesday's hearing.

Baptist Church Sues Illinois Village Over Occupancy Permit

The Chicagoland Baptist Church on Tuesday filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Lansing, Illinois over barriers placed in the way of the issuance of an occupancy permit for the church to use a former VFW meeting hall that it purchased.  Christian Newswire reports on the filing. The complaint (full text) in Chicagoland Baptist Church v. Village of Lansing, Illinois, (ND IL, filed 2/28/2012), claims that: "Although the zoning of the Property at the time of purchase allowed a church as a permitted use as of right, the Church has been unable to hold worship services in the VFW meeting hall because the Village has informed the Church that as a precondition to obtaining an occupancy permit, it must install various cost-prohibitive, unnecessary, legally not require and wasteful systems to the building." The complaint sets out a series of actions by city officials that have thwarted the church's attempt to use the building for its worship. Relying on the 1st and 14th Amendments, as well as the Illinois Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the church seeks a declaratory judgment, an injunction and damages.

Tennessee High Court Allows Abuse Suit Against Diocese To Proceed

In Redwing v. Catholic Bishop for the Diocese of Memphis, (TN Sup. Ct., Feb. 27, 2012), the Tennessee Supreme Court, in a clergy sex abuse lawsuit, held that:

the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine does not necessarily immunize religious institutions from all claims for damages based on negligent hiring, supervision, or retention. Tennessee's courts may address these claims, as long as they can do so using neutral principles of law and can refrain from resolving religious disputes and from relying on religious doctrine....

It also held that plaintiff can pursue a breach of fiduciary duty claim against the diocese of Memphis "as long as the fiduciary relationship is not based on a religious duty or is not inextricably tied to a religious duty...."

The court also held that the fraudulent concealment doctrine may apply to toll the statute of limitations in the case:

the allegation that the Diocese misled Mr. Redwing and his family could be construed to mean that at some point, Mr. Redwing or his family asked the Diocese about its knowledge of Fr. Guthrie's conduct and that the Diocese's response misled them....  The allegations... could, if proven, provide a basis for a reasonable fact-finder to conclude that Mr. Redwing, lacking any basis for suspecting that the Diocese would deceive him, acted with reasonable diligence and, therefore, that he should not be held to have known that the Diocese's conduct caused him injury.

Laos Province Seizes Third Church To Be Used As School

Radio Free Asia reported yesterday that in Laos' southern province of Savannakhet, officials have for the third time since last September seized a Christian church building. All three of the seized churches will be reopened as schools. Authorities have also begun to require Christians who gather even in homes for Sunday services to obtain approval for each Sunday morning's gathering.

Hungarian Parliament Recognizes 18 More Faith Groups

Under Hungary's new Law on Churches passed last month, all churches other than those of 14 traditional faiths, must apply to Parliament if they want formal recognition. (See prior posting.) According to BosNewsLife, Hungary's Parliament on Monday formally recognized an additional 18 faith groups-- the United Methodist Church in Hungary; the Hungarian Pentecostal Church; St. Margaret’s Anglican Episcopal Church; the Transylvanian Congregation; the Seventh-day Adventist Church; the Coptic Orthodox Church of Hungary; the Apostolic Christian Church Nazarene; the Hungarian Society for Krishna Consciousness; the Free Church of the Salvation Army of Hungary; the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; Jehovah’s Witnesses; two Muslim denominations and five Buddhist religious communities. Formal recognition qualifies the church for tax-free status and government support, and allows a church to collect donations during services and perform pastoral work in jails and hospitals.

Texas Refuses To Reschedule State Basketball Tourney Times For Jewish Team

JTA reports that the Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools ruled yesterday that it will not reschedule the state basketball semi-finals to accommodate Sabbath observance by the team of the Robert M. Beren Academy of Houston, a Jewish day school. Currently Beren is scheduled to play Dallas Covenant on Friday night in one of the two semifinal games, with the finals scheduled for 2 p.m. the next day. Beren's head of school, Rabbi Harry Sinoff, said: "Just as TAPPS doesn’t schedule games on Sunday in deference to Christian teams, we expected that as a Jewish team, there would be grounds for a scheduling change."

UPDATE: CNN reported March 1 that TAPPS, threatened with the filing of a lawsuit to obtain a TRO if they did not, has rescheduled the Friday playoffs for Friday afternoon. Also it will rescheduled the finals to 8 p.m. Saturday if the Beren Academy team ends up in them.

Dismissal of Harassment Charge Characterized By Critics As Acceptance of Sharia Defense

The Huffington Post reported yesterday on the storm of controversy around the Internet over a ruling by Pennsylvania state trial court judge Mark Martin dismissing a harassment charge that had been brought against a Muslim man who, during a Halloween parade, apparently attacked an atheist who was marching in the parade dressed as "Zombie Muhammad." According to the National Review, Ernest Perce, wore a “Zombie Mohammed” costume and pretended to walk among the dead, in the company of an associate who was the “Zombie Pope”.  Muslim immigrant Talag Elbayomy, attempted to pull the sign off of Perce. His attorney argued that Elbayomy thought it was a crime to insult the prophet Mohammed and acted to set an example for his children who were with him.

According to the National Review's transcript, the judge ruled from the bench:

I’ve got two sides of the story that are in conflict with each other.... I can’t believe that, if there was this kind of conflict going on in the middle of the street, that somebody didn’t step forward sooner to try and intervene....

But another part of the element [of the offense charged] is... “Was the defendant’s intent to harass, annoy or alarm — or was it his intent to try to have the offensive situation negated?”

If his intent was to harass, annoy or alarm, I think there would have been a little bit more of an altercation. Something more substantial as far as testimony going on that there was a conflict. Because there is not, it is not proven to me beyond a reasonable doubt that this defendant is guilty of harassment. Therefore I am going to dismiss the charge.

The furor over the decision however stems from other remarks by the judge chastising Perce for wearing the costume.  The court said in part:

I have a copy of the Koran here, and I would challenge you, sir, to show me where it says in the Koran that Mohammed arose and walked among the dead.... Before you start mocking someone else’s religion you may want to find out a little bit more about it. That makes you look like a doofus....

.... It’s unfortunate that some people use the First Amendment to deliberately provoke others. I don’t think that’s what our forefathers really intended. I think our forefathers intended that we use the First Amendment so that we can speak our mind, not to piss off other people and other cultures, which is what you did....

Islam is not just a religion, it’s their culture, their culture. It’s their very essence, their very being. They pray five times a day towards Mecca..... Then what you have done is you’ve completely trashed their essence, their being. 

The ruling is being described by some as the judge's accepting a shariah defense to violation of Pennsylvania law. Apparently Perce [corrected] has received hundreds of death threats since the ruling was handed down.

County Employees Required To Attend Constitution Course Tinged With Religion

In Carroll County, Maryland, questions have been raised about County Council last week requiring county employees to attend a seminar on the Maryland constitution led by a conservative Christian minister. The Baltimore Sun last week reported that the seminar was to be led by pastor David Whitney, speaking for the Institute on the Constitution. The Institute's description of its Maryland Constitution Course says: "As the student becomes familiar with the content of our State’s Constitution, it is our belief that the student will gain an understanding of the foundational principles and Biblical worldview of Maryland’s founders."

In India Protesters Demand Dropping Charges Against Religious Procession Displaying Swords

In the Indian city of Rajkot, a number of Hindu organizations, supported by both the Congress and BJP parties, have launched demonstrations to protest the arrest by local police of 37 people who displayed swords in a procession last week celebrating the Hindu festival of Maha Shivratri (The Night of Shiva). Express India today reports that the 37 were charged under the Indian Arms Act 1959.  The protesters say, however, that the procession, with its display of swords, is a 30-year old tradition for celebration of the religious festival. So far, local authorities have refused demands that the charges be withdrawn.