Latest news with #religiousliberty
Fox News
22-07-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
GOP lawmakers advocate for US condemnation of persecution against Christians in Muslim-majority nations
NEW You can now listen to Fox News articles! Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., is pushing a resolution that would indicate that the Senate denounces the persecution of Christians in Muslim-majority nations, while Rep. Riley Moore, R-W.V., and several other House Republicans are pushing a House version that would declare the lower chamber's condemnation of such persecution. The resolutions urge the president to prioritize the defense of persecuted Christians in America's foreign policy, including via "diplomatic engagement with Muslim-majority countries" as well as "efforts to stabilize the Middle East." The proposed resolutions also urge the president to leverage the diplomatic toolkit "to advance the protection of persecuted Christians worldwide and within Muslim-majority countries." AMERICANS LOOK AT THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY AND SEE A 'DUMPSTER FIRE': SEN. JOSH HAWLEY Fox News Digital reached out to the White House, which did not provide comment. "Our country was founded on religious liberty. We cannot sit on the sidelines as Christians around the world are being persecuted for declaring Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. We must condemn these heinous crimes," Hawley said, according to press releases issued by the offices of Hawley and Moore. "Year after year, the number of Christians murdered by extremists in Nigeria has numbered in the thousands. Millions more have been displaced. We cannot allow this to continue. I urge my colleagues to join me in condemning the persecution of Christians around the world by supporting this resolution." CHRISTIANS INCREASINGLY PERSECUTED WORLDWIDE AS 'MODERN AND HISTORICAL FACTORS CONVERGE' Original cosponsors in the House included GOP Reps. Greg Steube of Florida, Michael Guest of Mississippi, Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin, Addison McDowell of North Carolina, Brandon Gill of Texas, Pat Harrigan of North Carolina, and Anna Paulina Luna of Florida. While not an original cosponsor, Rep. Warren Davidson, R-Ohio, is a cosponsor of the resolution in the House, according to FEARS REMAIN THIS EASTER THAT CHRISTIANS IN NIGERIA ARE BEING 'WIPED OUT' BY MUSLIM EXTREMISTS CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP "Around the world, our brothers and sisters in Christ face rampant persecution for simply acknowledging the name of Jesus. That is unacceptable. In Nigeria alone, more than 50,000 Christians have been martyred and more than 5 million have been displaced simply for professing their faith. During a Divine Liturgy in Damascus last month, an islamic jihadist opened fire on worshippers and detonated an explosive device — killing at least 30 and wounding dozens more. These examples illustrate the violence and death Christians face on a daily basis," Moore said, according to press releases. "Unfortunately, decades of U.S. foreign policy blunders have exacerbated this crisis, with ethno-religious cleansing accelerating in Iraq after our failure to stabilize the country following the 2003 invasion. We as lawmakers cannot continue to sit idly by. I urge my colleagues to join me in condemning the persecution of Christians across the globe."
Fox News
27-06-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
Parent groups, religious liberty experts hail SCOTUS upholding parents rights in LGBTQ books case
The Supreme Court's decision on Friday supporting Maryland parents who fought to withdraw their children from LGBTQ storybook lessons in elementary school classrooms was hailed as a victory for parents' rights and religious liberty. "Today's victory sent a resounding message to activist school board members and educators nationwide: parental rights are not optional, and our children are not sounding boards or political tools for your radical agendas," Alleigh Marré, executive director of the parental rights group, American Parents Coalition, said in a statement following the ruling. "This victory offered critical clarification to activist school board members in Montgomery County, Maryland, who displayed disdain for parental authority and opt-outs, making it clear that teaching 3-year-olds about radical gender ideology was a higher priority than student learning, much less parental rights," she added. In a 6-3 decision that fell along ideological lines, the court held that parents were entitled to opt their children out of school lessons that could violate their religious beliefs. "We have long recognized," Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the majority, "the rights of parents to direct 'the religious upbringing' of their children. And we have held that those rights are violated by government policies that substantially interfere with the religious development of children." "We reject this chilling vision of the power of the state to strip away the critical right of parents to guide the religious development of their children," Alito wrote. The parents, from Muslim, Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox faiths, sued Montgomery County Public Schools after the district refused to allow parents the choice to withdraw their school-age children from being introduced to LGBTQ pride storybooks in the classroom. According to Becket, the legal group representing the parents' case, the books "champion pride parades, gender transition and pronoun preferences for children." While the school board initially allowed parents to opt their children out of this curriculum, the board quickly reversed course after too many parents requested opt-outs, believing it "undermined the schools' educational obligations toward inclusion, equity, and respect," according to the ACLU, who filed an amicus brief with the court in support of the school district. The families alleged the forced participation in these lessons violated their parental rights and religious convictions protected under the First Amendment. In a scathing dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said that allowing children to be "insulated from exposure to ideas and concepts that may conflict with their parents' religious beliefs" was a threat to democracy and multicultural society. "Today's ruling ushers in that new reality. Casting aside longstanding precedent, the Court invents a constitutional right to avoid exposure to 'subtle' themes 'contrary to the religious principles' that parents wish to instill in their children," she wrote. "The result will be chaos for this nation's public schools," Sotomayor added. A law professor who specializes in religious liberty cases and lives in Montgomery County told Fox News Digital that the court wasn't threatening diversity, but actually protecting diversity of opinion. "It's really about protecting pluralism in a fundamental, principled way," Professor Asma Uddin said. "If the concern is about inclusion and making space for diverse viewpoints, then that has to extend beyond a certain set of things that have to be presented to also give space for diverse viewpoints. We can do that through procedural flexibility – the ability to opt out from these readings." Uddin, a fellow at the Faith and Media Initiative who will be teaching constitutional law at Michigan State University in the fall, called it troubling the way the school board dismissed the views of these parents, referencing how one member even compared their views to those of "White supremacists." "It has to be something where people have genuine rights to disagree even on things that are just really contentious, that are really core to who we are as people, to our identities. It's got to be a space where we can have a diversity of views on that," she added. According to Becket, the Montgomery County School Board is one of the few school boards across the nation to ban notices and opt-outs for parents on sexuality and gender instruction. Parents in this case were not trying to ban LGBTQ books from the classroom, but were asking that they be notified before they are used in classroom instruction and be given the option to withdraw their children from these lessons. Kelsey Reinhardt, president and CEO of CatholicVote, a conservative political advocacy group, reacted to the ruling in a statement, saying, "It should alarm every American that such a case needed the intervention of the nation's highest court. It is worth stating clearly that the state cannot raise your child better than you. Parents, not politicians or activists, are the primary educators of their children." "The Court's ruling sends a clear and powerful message: America still respects the rights of parents to raise their children in line with their faith and conscience. And school boards have no business putting ideology over families. Let this decision renew our courage. We must continue to stand firm against efforts to undermine the family, which is the first school of love, truth, and freedom," she added. Lawyer and president of the conservative Judicial Crisis Network Carrie Severino said in a statement, "Public school children shouldn't be hostages in the culture wars, and today's Supreme Court case affirmed that by restoring the rights of parents to direct the education of their children, especially their religious education." "Ten years ago in Obergefell, Justice Kennedy promised that religious rights would continue to be respected, even in the face of an increasingly doctrinaire LGBTQ orthodoxy. Unfortunately, it has taken a decade of Court decisions to correct the many lower courts who have denegrated First Amendment rights, but today's decision is a major victory in that effort," she added.
Wall Street Journal
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Wall Street Journal
U.S. Supreme Court 9, Wisconsin Supreme Court 0
Justice Sonia Sotomayor's unanimous opinion last week in favor of a Catholic Charities nonprofit was a good win for religious liberty, and we've already discussed what it says about the Supreme Court. Permit us to add a final thought, which is that the 9-0 decision is a humiliation for the Wisconsin Supreme Court's new 4-3 liberal majority. The state jurists had denied a religious tax exemption to a local diocese's Catholic Charities Bureau (CCB) and associated groups. Their activities were 'secular in nature' and didn't involve teaching the faith or supplying religious materials, the Wisconsin court said. It rejected almost out of hand the First Amendment argument that ultimately won the day.
Fox News
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
EXCLUSIVE: Legal institute celebrates SCOTUS decision, declares 'religious liberty is alive and well'
EXCLUSIVE: A legal organization whose mission it is to defend the religious liberty of Americans has called the Supreme Court's 9-0 ruling in favor of the Catholic Charities Bureau (CCB) "a huge moment for religious liberty in America," and a clear rejection of government overreach into religious life. "This was not a hard call," Tiffany Dunkin, a legal fellow and attorney with the First Liberty Institute, emphasized in an interview with Fox News Digital, citing Thursday's unanimous SCOTUS decision to strike down Wisconsin's attempt to withhold a religious tax exemption because the CCB does not proselytize or serve only Catholics. "What Wisconsin was doing… they were saying that the Catholic Charities was not a religious institution because they did not proselytize or serve people of their own faith," Dunkin explained. "What they were doing was deciding what it means to be religious," she added. "And the First Amendment prohibits the government from doing that." The case, Catholic Charities Bureau Inc. v. Wisconsin Labor and Industry Review Commission, questioned whether faith-based nonprofits that provide public services are "religious enough" to receive the same benefits as churches or houses of worship. Catholic Charities, affiliated with the Diocese of Superior, Wisconsin, provides critical care services for people with disabilities and mental health needs. Wisconsin argued those acts were not "primarily religious." The Supreme Court disagreed. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, writing the opinion for the court, stated clearly that the government has no authority to assess or rank the religious nature of charitable work. Dunkin said the consequences of the ruling go far beyond Wisconsin. "This is actually a pretty ongoing problem across the country," she noted. "It's not just Wisconsin. First Liberty Institute represents Dad's Place in Bryan, Ohio… they're saying that because you're running a 24-7 homeless shelter, you're not [religious]." Other clients of Plano, Texas-based First Liberty in Colorado and Arizona have faced similar arguments from local governments, which question whether providing food, clothing or shelter to those in need is inherently religious. "Even though there are churches doing this kind of work, the governments are saying, 'Well, you're not religious enough,'" Dunkin said. The court's language in the ruling, Dunkin pointed out, "affirms what the Supreme Court has said for nearly a century," that the government cannot choose which expressions of faith are valid. "This sends a great message to people of all religions and all charitable organizations," she said. "The government… cannot intrude into telling you exactly what you can and can't do, whether you're religious or not religious, in order to receive a government benefit or participate in society." Had SCOTUS ruled the other way, Dunkin warned, it would have "grave implications" for religious charities and ministries nationwide. "It would allow the government to step into the religious doctrine of all faiths more than our Founding Fathers ever intended," she said. "The government cannot step in and get involved in deciding and picking and choosing between one type of religious activity and another." When asked what this means for churches and ministries on the ground, Dunkin's answer was clear: "They should feel emboldened to continue to do what they feel called to do by their religious faith… especially in a charitable sense." And for those who may see this as a one-off legal win? Not so fast. "I see this really as two different things," she said. "One, an affirmance of what the First Amendment has always stood for… but of course, going forward, we do hope and we're encouraged that religious liberty in America is alive and well. And of course, First Liberty Institute is here to continue to fight for that."
Wall Street Journal
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Wall Street Journal
A Religious Charter School Falls Short at the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court's big religious-liberty case ended with a whimper Thursday, and what a pity. A ruling in favor of St. Isidore, a proposed Catholic charter school in Oklahoma, could have bolstered religious freedom and educational options. Instead the Court split 4-4. That means the state judiciary's decision against St. Isidore stands. How did the Roberts Court's remarkable run on religious liberty end here? The deadlock was possible because Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused herself from Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board v. Drummond. She didn't explain why, as is common practice at the Court. Some speculate that the reason is her association from her Notre Dame days with a Notre Dame law professor who advised St. Isidore.
