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The Rev. Barry W. Lynn

May 22, 2012
Religious Groups’ Join Wobbly Attack on Birth Control
by Jeremy Leaming

University of Notre Dame’s religious leader the Rev. John Jenkins claims the string of federal lawsuits challenging the Obama administration’s health care policy on birth control is all about protecting religious freedom. But in reality the lawsuits are on wobbly legal ground, and Jenkins’ assertion about protecting a cherished First Amendment freedom is tired.

Like a federal lawsuit lodged earlier this year on behalf of Ave Maria University, a Catholic institution in Florida, the new lawsuits argue that a portion of the health care reform law requiring insurance companies to provide birth control to employees, including ones at religious institutions, is a serious affront to the religious institutions’ free exercise of religion rights.

The Affordable Care Act, however, does not single out religious entities for unheard of treatment. Instead it is a law of general applicability, meaning it covers secular and religious institutions. There are all kinds of laws of general applicability, which may offend religious beliefs, but do not amount to a violation of the free exercise of religion.

Nonetheless, the religious groups are apparently counting on judicial activism from some of 12 federal courts where their lawsuits have been lodged. In a press release about his school’s lawsuit, Jenkins stuck to the religious liberty canard, saying it “is about the freedom of religious organizations to live its mission ….”

Irin Carmon, reporting for Salon on the religious groups’ legal actions, agrees with Angela Bonavoglia’s assertion that “this struggle is part of a larger crackdown by conservative hierarchy against liberal elements within it – chiefly, women, including nuns.”

Others such as the public interest group Americans United for Separation of Church and State say the Catholic organizations are looking to the courts to help them revive faltering church doctrine.

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Civil rights, Religion clauses, Other courts, Reproductive freedom, Women's rights, First Amendment, Affordable Care Act, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, birth control, Cecile Richards, Health Care Law, Health Care Reform, Irin Carmon, Obama administration, Planned Parenthood, The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, the Rev. John Jenkins, University of Notre Dame
January 11, 2012
High Court Sides with Mich. Church in Employment Discrimination Case
by Jeremy Leaming

Daniel Mach, director of ACLU’s Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, wrote for ACSblog last summer about religious organizations' ability to shield themselves from anti-discrimination laws, citing their First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion. He asked whether religious institutions have a “categorical free pass to discriminate against certain people, regardless of the reason.”

Today, in what The New York Times’ Adam Liptak suggested may be the U.S. Supreme Court’s “most significant religious liberty decision in two decades,” sided with a Michigan church’s effort to avoid defending itself against an employment discrimination charge lodged by a teacher it had fired after she took sick leave, and for informing the church she planned to persue an employment discrimination claim against the church.

In Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a unanimous Court led by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. found, in this instance, that a so-called “ministerial exception,” provided the Redford, Mich. church protection from Cheryl Perich’s employment discrimination claim. (When Perich took sick leave to treat a disability, the church eventually hired a replacement teacher. After Perich presented church officials with a letter from her physician that she was cleared to start work again, church officials urged her to resign and except payment of a portion of her health insurance premiums. When she refused to do so, church officials informed her they were considering letting her go, and she responded by warning them she planned to lodge an employment discrimination complaint.)

Since the passage of the Civil Rights of 1964 and other employment discrimination laws, Roberts explained that the federal appeals courts “have uniformly recognized the existence of a ‘ministerial exception,’ grounded in the First Amendment, that precludes application of such legislation to claims concerning the employment relationship between a religious institution and its ministers.”

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Religion clauses, Supreme Court, Economic, Workplace and Environment Regulation, First Amendment, Chief Justice John Roberts, Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC, ministerial exception, The Rev. Barry W. Lynn
August 5, 2011
Texas Gov. Rick Perry Promotes Exclusive Religious Gathering
by Jeremy Leaming

Seeking divine guidance for answers to the ongoing effects of the Great Recession, or possibly to shake-up the 2012 Republican presidential race, Texas Gov. Rick Perry is set to headline a Christian evangelical rally tomorrow at the Houston Texans’ football stadium.

The event, dubbed “The Response: a call to prayer for a nation in crisis,” is being backed by major Religious Right players, such as the American Family Association and TV preacher John Hagee, and will likely feature the Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins.

In a video message on The Response’s website, a grinning Gov. Perry says, in part:

I’m inviting you to join your fellow Americans in a day of prayer and fasting on behalf of our nation. As an elected leader, I’m all too aware of government’s limitations when it comes to fixin things that are spiritual in nature. That’s where prayer comes in. And we need it more than ever, with the economy in trouble, communities in crisis, and people adrift in a sea of moral relativism. We need God’s help. That’s why I’m calling on Americans to pray and fast, like Jesus did, and as God called the Israelites to do in the book of Joel.

Beyond urging Americans to flock to the Texas football stadium for a day of evangelical Christian festivities, he’s also reached out to other governors to join. The Washington Post notes that only Kan. Gov. Sam Brownback, a longtime Christian Right warrior, is apparently the only one, so far, to have accepted the invitation.

The Post article also notes that groups concerned about protecting the First Amendment principle that calls for a certain amount of separation between government and religion are trying to raise awareness of the governor’s religious endeavor, and the ideals it is promoting -- ones that are not inclusive of an increasingly diverse America.

The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State told The Post, “Governor Perry’s decision to sponsor a ‘Christians-only’ prayer rally is bad enough. That he turned to an array of intolerant religious extremists to put it on for him is even worse.”

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Religion clauses, First Amendment, American Family Association, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Gov. Rick Perry, John Hagee, Texas, The Response, The Rev. Barry W. Lynn

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