RP Witness

“Tebow Bills” Abound

Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow’s success on the football field hasn’t just gotten the attention of every sportswriter in the country or sparked the use of a new verb (“Tebowing”) this year. If some legislators have their way, it could pave a whole new avenue for homeschoolers to be able to play on organized sports teams at their local public schools.

Tebow, now 24, grew up in Florida–one of 24 states with “equal access” laws that allow homeschooled students to participate in extracurricular activities at their local public high schools. But in recent years, at least three others–Alabama, Arkansas and Kentucky–have introduced legislation specifically named after Tebow to have the same privilege. And Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell said he’d support similar legislation introduced there.

“Homeschool parents pay taxes like everybody else,” he said. “It’s just fair.” (WNS)

N.H. House Defunds Planned Parenthood

The New Hampshire House of Representatives voted 207-147 on Jan. 18 to pass a bill stripping state funding of Planned Parenthood and any other group performing elective abortions.

The 60-vote majority was plenty to pass HB 228 on to the state Senate, but not enough to override a potential veto from Gov. John Lynch.

“The majority of people agree that, regardless of individual beliefs, taxpayers should not be forced to contribute to the largest abortion provider in American when so many are diametrically religiously and morally opposed to the practice of abortions,” House Speaker Bill O’Brien said. (WNS)

Nigerian Christians Face Ultimatum

A church gathering in northeastern Nigeria turned deadly Jan. 5, as gunmen attacked Deeper Life Church in the country’s Gombe State, killing six and wounding several others. Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW)–a Christian advocacy group with workers in Nigeria–reported on the raid and said the dead included the pastor’s wife. The attack came one day after a Nigerian terrorist group’s deadline for Christians expired: A purported spokesman for Boko Haram–an Islamic extremist group responsible for widespread attacks in Nigeria–had demanded on Monday that Christians living in the predominantly Muslim north leave the region by Wednesday. On Wednesday evening, CSW reported that suspected Boko Haram gunmen attacked a Christian compound in the northern Yobe State, killing two.

The ultimatum came one week after Boko Haram claimed responsibility for a series of Christmas Day attacks in Nigeria that killed at least 41 people. The deadliest bombing at St Theresa’s Catholic Church in Madalla killed at least 37 parishioners who were leaving a Christmas Day Mass at the packed church. (WNS)

Supreme Court Issues Unanimous Decision in Church Hiring Case

By Emily Belz

In one of the clearest rulings for religious freedom in years, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously decided that courts may not intervene in church hiring decisions, protecting the “ministerial exception” that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sought to eliminate in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC.

“[T]he authority to select and control who will minister to the faithful is the church’s alone,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the court’s opinion. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Elena Kagan wrote separate concurring opinions that said the ministerial exception should be even broader than Roberts allowed in his opinion.

“It was a strong rebuke to the extreme position taken by the Obama administration,” said Luke Goodrich of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, who served as counsel to the church in the case. “One of the biggest things is it’s unanimously decided, which nobody was predicting and is a really big deal…It’s a great day for religious liberty.”

The high court has never ruled on the ministerial exception before, a standard created in the lower courts, and the opinion shied away from defining who qualifies as a “minister,” saying simply that the teacher in question, a commissioned minister at the Lutheran church school, qualified.

“We are reluctant…to adopt a rigid formula for deciding when an employee qualifies as a minister,” Roberts wrote in the decision. Kagan and Alito, in their concurring opinion, wrote that the “title” of minister “is neither necessary nor sufficient,” given the variety of religions in the United States, but rather courts must defer to the religious organization’s evaluation of the employee’s role.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled in favor of the teacher, saying she did not qualify as a minister because she spent more minutes of the day teaching secular subjects than religious subjects. The Supreme Court scoffed at that idea. “The issue before us…is not one that can be resolved by a stopwatch,” Roberts wrote.

During the oral arguments, some of the justices seemed bothered by the facts of the case. The Hosanna-Tabor teacher, Cheryl Perich, had narcolepsy and took leave from the Redford, Mich.-based school, which is affiliated with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Perich eventually returned to work but the school didn’t think she was ready to teach, and Perich threatened a lawsuit if the school did not reinstate her. The school revoked her commission as a minister and then fired her, on the grounds that she had circumvented the church tribunals that handle such disputes. (Alito, perhaps dryly, added 1 Corinthians 6:1-7 in the notes of his concurring opinion, verses that tell believers not to go before “the ungodly for judgment.”) (WNS)

5th Circuit: Texas Sonogram Law can be Implemented

On Jan. 10, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a Texas law requiring abortionists to show women sonograms of their preborn babies at least 24 hours before performing abortions is constitutionally sound, and may be implemented.

The law has been blocked since August, with abortion advocacy groups claiming it was “vague” and “compelled speech” from abortionists, violating their First Amendment rights.

The law also requires abortionists to make the baby’s heartbeat audible to the woman and explain what happens to the baby during the abortion. Women are required to sign a form noting they’ve been given all the information.

“Now the woman can hear the sounds of her own baby’s heartbeat and see the picture of her own child–not a picture from a textbook or something else,” said Allan Parker, president of The Justice Foundation, one of several law firms representing 317 post-abortive women who wish they’d had a sonogram law to inform their decisions. “This scientific evidence will refute the lies of abortionists…that the contents of the uterus are ‘just a mass of tissue,’ ‘just a blob,’ or ‘not yet a baby.’” (WNS)

Battle of New York

By Tiffany Jones

Police on Jan. 12 arrested 43 New York City pastors and lay people who were protesting the city’s ban on church use of public schools for worship services. The ban is scheduled to go into effect on Feb. 12.

The arrests came after more than 200 persons gathered in the rain outside a Bronx public school where Mayor Michael Bloomberg was giving his State of the City address. After singing songs and cheering speeches, protesters walked out in orderly groups of five to eight to kneel in front of barricades and pray. Police warned them to leave and then made arrests on charges of disorderly conduct.

The New York Board of Education wants to ban religious use of schools on Sunday mornings or at other times the schools are otherwise unused–even though the churches rent the space, dropping an estimated several million dollars per year into the city cashbox. If the ban prevails, more than 150 congregations will have to move to other meeting space starting next month–and that’s hard to find in New York City.

One week before the large protest, police arrested New York City Councilman and pastor Fernando Cabrera, pastor Bill Devlin, and five others on charges of “criminal trespassing.” Their alleged trespass was kneeling and singing two hymns outside the doors of the New York City Law Department. Police held them in custody for three hours.

The following day, Jan. 6, the New York Housing Authorities reversed its position to evict churches that meet inside community centers. Board of Education officials stuck with their ban, though, saying it will protect the minds of “impressionable youth.”

Attempts at a legislative fix are underway. New York Assemblyman Nelson Castro has introduced Bill A08800, which would allow “the use of school buildings and school sites for religious meetings and worship when not in use for school purposes or when such service or worship is deemed not disruptive of normal school operations.” (WNS)

NEA, Liberal Groups Release National Sex-Ed Standards

Kindergarten through second grade. That’s the grade at which the National Education Association (NEA), the Future of Sex Education Initiative and a coalition of sex-ed groups want children to start learning the names of body parts and alternative family structures. The recommendations are outlined in the National Sexuality Education Standards released on Monday to school districts nationwide. Although they are non-binding, having the weight of the NEA behind the recommendations could give them the gravitas needed to quickly–and quietly–be implemented around the country. (WNS)

Study: A Home with a Mom and a Dad Improves Boys’ Behavior in School

An analysis of 20 years’ worth of school suspension rates nationwide shows that the greatest influence on boys’ behavior at school is not the type of school they attend or teacher they have, but the type of home in which they’re being raised. Researchers at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business found that boys being raised in intact homes with both parents had the least behavioral problems and school suspensions, while those being raised by single mothers had the most. However, this was not found to be the case among girls. (WNS)