Religious Beliefs and Speech

Connecticut court says the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine prevents it from deciding whether a religious organization is liable for not conducting a mental fitness evaluation.

The Trinity Lutheran case is the U.S. Supreme Court’s latest religious liberty decision. Learn more about this important case with the overview update.

Should a religious college be considered a public accommodation? A recent case from Pennsylvania says yes and also decides that no First Amendment defenses apply.

This post outlines a suit by a gay student against his Catholic high school and provides some practice pointers for religious schools on avoiding similar issues.

In most states, confidential communications between clergy and parishioner are privileged, meaning they can remain protected from disclosure even if litigation about them arises, but there are limits to the privilege.

Religious schools have always had the right to decide whether students should have to keep a moral code as a condition of enrollment. A recent case out of Texas, In re St. Thomas High School, solidifies this right.

Not everything a church does to a pastor is outside the reach of the court. That is a recent lesson church officials learned in a case out of Ohio federal court dealing with the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine. Also known as the church autonomy doctrine, this is the principle that civil courts will stay out of the doctrinal and important decisions a church makes, such as the decision to fire a pastor or remove a parishioner from membership.

When someone brings their church to court in Texas there are two things the court is likely to do. The court may refuse to hear the case because it would require getting into church doctrine or issues that are reserved to the church’s decision-making (“church autonomy” or “ecclesiastical abstention”). Or, the court could hear the case just like any other civil action because the court can decide the case using “neutral principles of law.” These are the principles of law that control the case when doctrine is not critical.

This post is an update to the “Local Government and Legislative Prayer--Can They Pray or Not?” post.

A multi-chapter resource by Theresa Lynn Sidebotham, Esq. and Dr. Brent Lindquist about ministerial exception and missions.