Religion Law Commons^™

Petition For Writ Of Certiorari, Melhorn V. Baltimore Washington Conf. Of United Methodist Church, Leslie C. Griffin

Supreme Court Briefs

No abstract provided.

Religious Freedom In Faith-Based Educational Institutions In The Wake Of 'Obergefell V. Hodges': Believers Beware, Charles J. Russo

Educational Leadership Faculty Publications

Solicitor General Donald Verrilli’s fateful words, uttered in response to a question posed by Justice Samuel Alito during oral arguments in Obergefell v. Hodges,² likely sent chills up the spines of leaders in faith-based educational institutions, from pre-schools to universities. In Obergefell, a bare majority of the Supreme Court legalized same-sex unions in the United States. Verrilli’s words, combined with the outcome in Obergefell, have a potentially chilling effect on religious freedom. The decision does not only impact educational institutions—the primary focus of this article—but also a wide array of houses of worship. Other religiously affiliated …

Liberal, Conservative, And Political: The Supreme Court's Impact On The American Family In The Uber-Partisan Era, Marsha B. Freeman

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Fool Me Twice: Zubik V. Burwell And The Perils Of Judicial Faith In Government Claims, Mark L. Rienzi

Scholarly Articles

This article proceeds in three parts. Part I examines the three government concessions that made the Supreme Court’s Zubik decision possible and how those concessions ultimately revealed that it is possible to protect both contraceptive access and religious liberty. Part II discusses how the circuit courts were brought to emphatically adopt positions the government would ultimately abandon under the slightest pressure. Part III concludes with some key lessons lower courts should take from Zubik to better protect the integrity of both the court system and religious-liberty laws.

“Social Love” As A Vision For Environmental Law: Laudato Si’ And The Rule Of Law, Lucia A. Silecchia

Scholarly Articles

In the years of his still-young papacy, Pope Francis has often spoken and written about ecological responsibility, addressing both the Catholic and global communities in his exhortations on environmental matters. In June of 2015, he released his most extensive exposition on these issues in his encyclical letter, Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home.In this wide-ranging encyclical, Pope Francis expressed a fascinating paradox with respect to law and ecology. On the one hand, Laudato Si’ contains a stunningly enthusiastic endorsement of a strong local, national and, in particular, international legal system empowered to impose strict environmental and economic controls …

Introduction: The Islamic State And International Terrorism - The Architecture Of Response, Jonathan Michael Meyer

The International Lawyer

No abstract provided.

Laudato Si’ And Care For Our Common Home: What Does It Mean For The Legal Profession?, Lucia A. Silecchia

Scholarly Articles

Pope Francis’s recent encyclical, Laudato Si’ (“Praised Be You”), has been one of the most widely anticipated papal documents in recent memory. It has also received far more popular commentary than would be expected of a papal encyclical. Yet, while Laudato Si’ has been widely dubbed “the climate change” encyclical, it is far broader than that. It is also a far-reaching analysis of a number of political, economic, social and legal issues, in addition to being an extensive exposition on human duties toward creation.

In the text of this encyclical, there are also some important lessons to be gleaned for …

Religiously-Motivated Medical Neglect: A Response To Professors Levin, Jacobs, And Arora, Doriane Lambelet Coleman

Faculty Scholarship

This Response to Professors Levin, Jacobs, and Arora’s article To Accommodate or Not to Accommodate: (When) Should the State Regulate Religion to Protect the Rights of Children and Third Parties? focuses on their claim that the law governing religious exemptions to medical neglect is messy, unprincipled, and in need of reform, including because it violates the Establishment Clause. I disagree with this assessment and provide support for my position. Specifically, I summarize and assess the current state of this law and its foundation in the perennial tussle between parental rights and state authority to make decisions for and about the …

Granting Exemptions From Legal Duties: When Are They Warranted And What Is The Place Of Religion?, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

In what follows, I focus on when exemptions from legal duties are called for and whether religion should be a crucial ingredient. I concentrate especially on the present controversy over same-sex marriage, and how far people and organizations should be required to afford those couples equal status. But other kinds of exemptions can help us understand various general questions and provide key insights about this intense concern of our time.

My basic conclusions are these: religious convictions and practices do matter but only sometimes should they be legally distinguished from other bases. Considering all that is at stake, certain exemptions …

Islamic Law And Constitution-Making: The Authoritarian Temptation And The Arab Spring, Mohammad Fadel

Osgoode Legal Studies Research Paper Series

The political dynamics that have characterized post-Mubarak Egypt have often been understood to be a battle between "religious" forces, represented by the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters, and "secularist" forces, represented by a diverse group of civil society actors. Opposition of this latter group to the "religious" politics of the Muslim Brotherhood is therefore understood to be the primary cause of the events that led to the July 3, 2013 military coup that overthrew Egypt's only freely elected President, Mohammed Morsi. Without denying the salience of a religious-secularist divide in Egypt, this narrative of post-Mubarak politics fails to appreciate the …

The Global Struggle For Lgbtq Rights: Legal, Political, And Social Dimensions, Macarena Saez

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

No abstract provided.

Religious Accommodations For Sabbatarian Observance Among Library Staff, Paul A. Hartog

The Christian Librarian

Over the last twenty-five years, litigation related to religious discrimination in the workplace has been on the rise. One of the tension points has been the religious practice of Sabbath keeping, leading to employment scheduling conflicts. Title VII and its subsequent amendments require that employers seek “reasonable accommodations” for Sabbatarian observance. Such adjustments should not cause “undue hardship” to the employer, who is required to make a “good faith effort” at accommodation. This article discusses creative alternatives that managers of public libraries and nonsectarian academic libraries may implement when accommodating Seventh-Day Adventist and similar Sabbatarian staff members.

Rfra, State Rfras, And Religious Minorities, Christopher C. Lund

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Hanging In The Balance: The Rights Of Religious Minorities, Faisal Bhabha

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

The Propriety Of Religious Exemptions: A Response To Sager, Christopher C. Lund

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Rfras And Reasonableness, Steve Sanders

Indiana Law Journal

The organized opponents of legal and social equality for gays and lesbians, particularly the foes of marriage for same-sex couples, have coalesced in recent years around the rallying cry of "religious liberty." In 2015, the conflict between LGBT rights and religious liberty intensified as legislators in seventeen states considered adopting Religious Freedom Restoration Acts (RFRAs). Most of the national attention focused on Indiana, where legislators adopted a RFRA under pressure from religious conservatives, only to later amend it under pressure from business and civic leaders over concerns that the law sent a message endorsing anti-gay discrimination.

RFRAs, which typically require …

Diy Solutions To The Hobby Lobby Problem, Kristin Haule

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

No abstract provided.

Multicultural Adr And Family Law: A Brief Introduction To The Complexities Of Religious Arbitration, Michael J. Broyde

Faculty Articles

Recent polls indicate that the U.S. population is getting less religious and more secular. This seems to mirror the nation’s— and its laws’—movement away from reflecting certain traditional values. While these movements have left some members of the religious population in a precarious situation, surrounded by a society whose values are changing before their eyes, it has also caused the religious to cling tighter to their respective faiths and become more entrenched in the values they assert.

As the government has, slowly but surely, aligned itself with the popular shift away from traditional religious values, the pleas of the religious …

From Dysfunction And Polarization To Legislation: Native American Religious Freedom Rights And Minnesota Autopsy Law, Gail T. Kulick, Tadd M. Johnson, Rebecca St. George, Emily Segar-Johnson

Mitchell Hamline Law Review

No abstract provided.

Against Circumspection: Judges, Religious Symbols, And Signs Of Moral Independence, Benjamin Berger

Articles & Book Chapters

This chapter questions the interpretation of religious ­ signs and symbols— and the interpretive possibilities that emerge when we demand more from one another in thinking about such symbols— by ­ examining the question of judges and religious dress in the particular context of the judge’s role as wielding the coercive force of the state through the exercise of criminal punishment. I advance the argument that recent debates have proceeded on a misleadingly simplistic approach to understanding the meaning of signs of religious belonging and identity in this setting and that, with this, we miss an opportunity for a deeper …