Religious leaders line up in support of Supreme Court case

Unity among religious leaders is rare, but a pending U.S. Supreme Court case is drawing together a group beyond the boldest dreams of any interfaith parliament.

Leaders of Roman Catholics, Mormons, Presbyterians, United Methodists, Seventh-day Adventists, Hindus, United Sikhs, Muslims, Episcopalians, Reform Jews and Orthodox Jews are united.

So are the conservative National Association of Evangelicals and its liberal counterpart, the National Council of Churches.

So are devotees of Santeria, Yoruba and other religions you may not know.

Even the various Baptist denominations are all on the same side.

They all support the right of religious groups to hire and fire teachers who could be construed as “ministers” on grounds that would be otherwise discriminatory, whether due to race, gender and disability or other reasons. The case could affect hundreds of thousands of teachers and other employees in faith-based schools and organizations.

Dozens of organizations, religious and otherwise, are choosing up sides by filing friend-of-the-court briefs in the case.

Only one religious denomination — the Unitarian Universalist Association— supports the right of employees to sue organizations such as itself.

The high court is scheduled to hear arguments next week over a Michigan Lutheran school’s firing of a teacher who alleges discrimination because she has a disability.

The school’s lawyers argue that courts can’t review the claim because she was essentially a minister. (The school has since closed, but its denominational owners are defendants.)

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that she wasn’t a minister because her “primary duties” were to teach secular subjects.

At issue is the doctrine of the “ministerial exception.” [more]

SOURCE

USA Today