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3 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
A recent history of Supreme Court ties
This article was first published in the State of Faith newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Monday night. The Supreme Court's religious charter school case came in with a bang and ended with a tie. The justices announced Thursday that they were 'equally divided' in Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board v. Drummond, which means the Oklahoma Supreme Court's ruling against the first-of-its-kind school remains in place. The possibility of a deadlocked court had been floated ever since Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused herself. Still, Thursday's announcement felt surreal — and anticlimactic. Well, maybe anticlimactic is the wrong word. I wasn't so much disappointed as I was unsettled by the idea that the country is no closer to a consensus on religious charter schools today than it was before the Oklahoma case was fully briefed and argued. But admitting that probably makes me sound naive. Multiple closely watched Supreme Court cases have ended in ties over the past decade, or in extremely narrow rulings that said little about underlying constitutional questions. Ties on the Supreme Court can stem from recusals, as the Drummond ruling did, or from vacancies. After Justice Antonin Scalia died in February 2016, a few notable cases ended with a 4-4 vote, including United States v. Texas, which was about the Obama administration's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, and Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, which was about public school unions. Ties stemming from recusals are particularly common after a new justice is appointed to the court, because the justice can't participate in cases they considered or worked on in their previous position. In the case of a tie at the Supreme Court level, the lower court decision remains in place. Tie rulings may become more common moving forward as the justices adapt to the court's relatively new ethics code. The code, which was adopted in 2023, puts more pressure on the justices to track and disclose potential conflicts of interest. The new ethics rules likely explain why four justices recused themselves this month from considering whether to hear a case that involved a prominent book publisher, according to The Washington Post. Because there weren't six justices left to vote, the lower court ruling will remain in place. First-of-its-kind religious charter school blocked by deadlocked Supreme Court Prayer service at Pentagon sparks religious freedom debate New research on astrology, tarot cards and fortune tellers is full of surprises Omega Gym in Rome caters to an unusual clientele: priests, nuns and monsignors from the Vatican City. Pope Leo XIV went there several times a week over the past two years — when he was still known as Robert Prevost — as he tried to improve his 'posture and cardiovascular capacity,' according to The Associated Press. 'When the name of the pope was announced, my phone rings and my son tells me, 'Dad, it's Robert! Robert, our member!'' Francesco Tamburlani, the owner of the gym, told the AP. 'I heard the gym staff behind him cheering. ... This moved us, filled us with joy.' Tamburlani added that Pope Leo's gym membership is still active, although it's unclear if he'll be able to use it. 'We would organize our gym to guarantee his safety and his privacy. We would just need a sign,' he told the AP. By now, you're probably sick of hearing about young people drifting away from organized religion. But I'm only bringing that up again now to help explain my fascination with the fact that engagement with religious programming is actually on the rise on college campuses across the country. 'People want to feel loved for who they are and not what they do,' Chaz Lattimore Howard, the university chaplain at the University of Pennsylvania, told The Atlantic. Whether or not they believe in God, they 'want to be reassured that it's going to be okay.' In his latest article for Religion Unplugged, my friend Bobby Ross Jr. offered an in-depth look at a faith-focused event that set the stage for a Detroit Tigers baseball game. NPR recently visited a small community south of Tampa, Florida, that's reeling after a beloved local pastor was unexpectedly detained by ICE. The Rev. Maurilio Ambrocio had paperwork allowing him to be in the United States and checked in with immigration agents regularly, but he was still taken into detention in April. 'You're gonna take you know a community leader, a Pastor, a hard working man … What, did you need a number that day?," one of the pastor's neighbors told NPR. Earlier this month, I wrote about a surprising religious freedom battle in Toms River, New Jersey, involving a proposed homeless shelter, a proposed pickleball court and eminent domain. The New York Times covered the same conflict last week and summarized the latest developments. Hope you had a great Memorial Day weekend! Now it's time for the most important holiday season of all: my birthday week.
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Why declining trust is everyone's problem
This article was first published in the State of Faith newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Monday night. I think my husband and I have adjusted pretty well to the demands of parenting over the past five years. We go to bed earlier, keep more fruit in the fridge and play with bubbles a lot more now than we did when it was just the two of us at home. What we struggle with is taking breaks from parenting, even though we know it would be good for us to have date nights or lean into hobbies that have nothing to do with our kids. We talk about going out but then quickly drop the idea when it's time to find a babysitter. I know from conversations I've had with mom friends that our struggle is not unique. Across the country, parents without close friends or relatives nearby worry about leaving their kids with a near-stranger, despite the fact that parents have been doing just that for decades. Last week, as I read a new report on trust from Pew Research Center, I realized that the recent surge in anxiety about babysitters likely stems, at least in part, from a broader surge in distrust. Today, just one-third of U.S. adults (34%) say most people can be trusted. That's down from 46% in 1972. That data point bums me out even though I'm part of the problem. Pew's research showed that I'm right to assume that declining trust creates big problems — and not just for young parents. 'Trust is the oil that lubricates the frictions of daily life,' researchers wrote. In its absence, people are less likely to help their neighbors and friends. An absence of trust can also lead to dissatisfaction with life. 'People who say most people can be trusted report greater life satisfaction than those who say you can't be too careful. They tend to report being happier, more satisfied with their health and more likely to describe their family life as excellent or very good,' Pew found. Here are some other findings from the trust survey that stood out to me: White Americans are more trusting than non-white Americans and older Americans are more trusting than younger ones. Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are among the most trusting people of faith in the U.S. Nearly half (48%) of Latter-day Saints say most people can be trusted, compared to 35% of Catholics, 51% of Jews and 28% of Muslims, the survey showed. On a related note, Utah is among the country's most trusting states. Around half of adult Utahns say most people can be trusted, Pew found. Pew's study has prompted me to do some soul-searching — and at least entertain the idea of a kid-free date night. Urban Meyer says he almost left Ohio State over religion The case that could change the legal system as you know it First, he became pope. Then, he took down LeBron James Another major church is splitting with the Trump administration over refugees The Polaris Young Adult Leadership Network is a program run by Princeton Theological Seminary that serves young Christians who lead in non-church settings. The Polaris Network helps these leaders connect with others who put faith at the center of their careers while helping the seminary expand its mission at a time when demand for traditional ministry degrees is declining. 'In a lot of ways, these young people are teaching us how to be a seminary for the next generation,' said the Rev. Kenda Creasy Dean, the Mary D. Synnott professor of Youth, Church and Culture and one of the architects of Polaris, to Religion News Service. Religion News Service's article noted that the Polaris Network is one of many programs emerging to serve young people who are committed to Christian leadership but don't feel called to ministry. The Trump administration has rescinded a record-setting fine against one of the country's largest Christian schools, according to Christianity Today. The Biden administration previously hit Grand Canyon University with a $37.7 million penalty after investigating its grad program costs. Trump's task force on anti-Christian bias heard about the fine — and the school's claims of unfair treatment — during its first meeting in April. I loved The New York Times' recent look at the best ways to invite more happiness into your life. In addition to highlighting good advice, the article has a memorable layout with fun photos. I've written about how few people read books once they're no longer in school. A new study confirms that the Bible is among the books gathering dust on bookshelves. 'U.S. adults increasingly view the Bible as a book worth reading multiple times, but few have actually done so,' Lifeway Research reported. I wrote last week about the popularity of a Pope Leo trading card. Apparently, Pope Leo bobbleheads are selling well, too, according to a press release from the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum. And finally, my favorite religion headline of the week: Churches hope to tap the power of pickleball.
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
What you'll see on the pope's personal X account — and why it matters
A version of this article was first published in the State of Faith newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Monday night. Soon after Pope Leo XIV emerged on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica on Thursday, my husband sent me a screenshot of his X account. At first, I didn't believe the picture was real — Did the new pope really share an article from National Catholic Reporter, the same National Catholic Reporter that I regularly read? I was amazed to realize that the Catholic Church had just reached a historic milestone: For the first time, it had selected a pope who used X before he was pope. Pope Benedict XVI started using what was then called Twitter in 2012 with an official @Pontifex account. Pope Francis inherited that account and used it with the help of communications advisers over the past 12 years. (He didn't use computers on his own, per The Washington Post.) According to X, Robert Prevost (@drprevost) joined the social media site in August 2011. His bio reads, 'Católico, agustino, Obispo,' referring to his religion, his Catholic order and one of his past roles in the church (bishop.) In recent years, he hasn't posted that often, but what's on his page is raising more than a few eyebrows. That's primarily because of the political nature of his posts. He's shared several articles and quotes that criticize the first and second administrations of President Donald Trump. Count that National Catholic Reporter article among them. It's titled, "JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love for others," and explores tensions between the vice president and Catholic leaders over the Trump administration's approach to immigration. Over the past few years, Pope Leo also shared several updates about his predecessor, including calls for prayer for Pope Francis during his hospitalization in February and March, and commentary on challenges affecting Christians around the world. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance did not reference Pope Leo's social media activity in their statements on his election. But other conservatives did, including Laura Loomer, who criticized Pope Leo's posts and called him a 'Marxist puppet,' according to NBC News. As of Tuesday afternoon, the @drprevost account remains active on X and has more than 530,000 followers. The @Pontifex account, used by Pope Francis and Pope Benedict before him, says it's been archived. But the @Pontifex account on X is expected to be active again soon. The Vatican announced Tuesday morning that Pope Leo will use it, along with a new papal account on Instagram. 'The content published by Pope Francis (on X) will be archived on a special section of the Holy See's institutional website,' the Vatican said. Why studying spirituality is harder than you think Catholic leaders have picked a new pope — and he's American What Trump said about the first American pope An AI-generated image of Trump as pope prompted criticism. Here's how Trump responded A lawsuit seeks to limit access to abortion pills. The Trump administration wants it dismissed You've heard of eminent domain. What about seizing a church to build a soccer field? What's in a name? In the Catholic Church, quite a bit. A new pope's name choice is generally understood to signify what type of pope he wants to be. By choosing to be Leo XIV, Cardinal Robert Prevost was telling the world that he is focused on the church's social justice teachings, according to Religion News Service. 'The last pope of this name, Leo XIII, reigned as the world had been transformed by the Industrial Revolution. He set the church on the path of defending the working classes and calling for a more just economy. Leo XIII set the foundation upon which other popes and the Second Vatican Council built what is today's Catholic social teaching,' the article said. The new Pope Leo confirmed that he wanted to continue the work of Pope Leo XIII when meeting with cardinals on Saturday. The rise of artificial intelligence creates many of the same ethical challenges as were seen during the Industrial Revolution, he said, per The New York Times. Then, during his first Sunday blessing as pope, Pope Leo showed that his heart is with suffering people when he called for peace in Ukraine, as well as in India, Pakistan and Gaza. 'I carry in my heart the sufferings of the beloved Ukrainian people,' he said, per Religion News Service. 'Let everything possible be done to achieve genuine, just and lasting peace as soon as possible.' Pope Leo XIII and Pope Leo XIV are also linked by their unique relationships to major changes in the media landscape, as I discovered while researching my intro about the new pope's X account. While the current Pope Leo was the first to join X before becoming pope, Pope Leo XIII was the first pope to appear on film. He reigned from 1878 to 1903. I loved this story angle from The New York Times: Reporters visited Catholic churches with direct ties to Pope Leo to speak with worshippers about one of their own becoming the pope. Catholic leaders and the Justice Department are fighting back against a new law in Washington state that would require priests to break the seal of confession to report child abuse to secular law enforcement. The Justice Department has called the law 'anti-Catholic' and the Archdiocese of Seattle has said it will excommunicate priests who comply, per CBS News. The legal settlement between Yeshiva University officials and members of an LGBTQ student club has fallen apart less than two months after it was announced, according to New York Jewish Week. Officials at the Jewish school will no longer recognize the club, although students say it won't disband. Former Supreme Court Justice David Souter died on Thursday at age 85. I spent part of Friday reading about his legal legacy, including discussions of why he ended up in the court's liberal wing after being appointed by a Republican president. 'If his footprints through the court's various doctrinal fields were not particularly evident, there was no dispute about the fact that his vote mattered. Even as the court became more conservative and polarized, liberals managed to eke out some important victories, most by votes of 5 to 4, which would not have been possible had he turned out to be the justice that many conservatives assumed him to be at the time of his nomination,' read his obituary in The New York Times. Thanks to Pope Leo and The Athletic, I now know that the Vatican has a tennis court.
Yahoo
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
How an expert on church-state partnerships feels about the future
This article was first published in the State of Faith newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Monday night. I spent most of last week reflecting on the relationship between church and state. I know what you're thinking: That's probably a pretty typical week for a religious freedom nerd. But it really isn't, at least not for this religious freedom nerd. Most weeks I'm too busy writing about religion data, marathon runners, reality TV and the pope to spend much time wrestling with the First Amendment. But last week was different. Last week, I wrote multiple stories about the nation's first religious charter school and spent 30 minutes on the phone with the man who, over the past 10 years, taught me most of what I know about church-state funding partnerships, Stanley Carlson-Thies. Stanley Carlson-Thies is founder of the Institutional Religious Freedom Alliance and, until his retirement in 2025, the organizer of the Coalition to Preserve Religious Freedom in Washington, D.C. | Center for Public Justice Although Stanley would have been a good source for my charter school coverage, I was actually talking to him about his recent retirement and what he learned from working at the intersection of religion and government for more than three decades. I assumed he'd be frustrated to leave full-time work at a time when the funding landscape is rapidly and radically changing. He reminded me that change doesn't have to be a bad thing. Here's a look at our conversation. Kelsey Dallas: How did you come to work on church-state partnerships? Stanley Carlson-Thies: It took me forever to finish my PhD, which is from the University of Toronto. It's on changes in Dutch politics from the mid-19th century into the early 20th century, a period when some Reformed Christians and Catholics were working together to create more space for public expression of faith in politics. As I was finishing my PhD, I did some writing on welfare and economic policy in Canada, which included looking at how to better represent religious voices on Canadian radio and TV. It got me thinking about the government-religion interface. Then, we moved back to the states and I worked at two Christian colleges. I was at Dordt University in Iowa when Jim Skillen, then the president of the Center for Public Justice, asked me in 1992 to join CPJ and direct a study on Christian thinking about poverty and welfare. At the time, Washington was really focused on welfare reform. During that study, it became so evident so quickly how important faith-based organizations and houses of worship were for people in need. But it was also clear that religious organizations were running into legal challenges when they tried to partner with the government. I wanted to dig deeper into how the U.S. government related to faith-based organizations that were serving the public, so I applied for funding for what was called the Religious Social Sector Project. Through that project, I met Carl Esbeck, who championed church-state partnerships during Congress' work on welfare reform. When Congress overhauled the federal welfare system in 1996, every state had to rethink its approach to welfare. There were hundreds of questions, but nobody was really studying the religion part. I dove into that and published a report showing that most states weren't following the law when it came to partnerships with faith-based organizations. It got some states to change their policies. Through that work, I met George W. Bush, who was then the governor of Texas and really interested in creating a level playing field for faith-based organizations in social services work. I got to advise him a tiny bit during his campaign for president and, when he was elected, helped build his White House Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives. That experience in the White House working under a president who was very committed to this topic helped me recognize how slow the government is to make changes even when there's support for the change. After about 15 months, I asked to move back to the Center for Public Justice and focus on advocacy work again. Kelsey: How has the government's relationship to religion changed since you started researching the welfare system in the 1990s? Stanley: There was more interaction between religious organizations and the government in 1992 than people realize, but the government was essentially only giving funding to religious organizations that weren't acting religious. Since then, the Supreme Court has really changed how it applies the First Amendment to the funding context. It went from saying the government had to be as careful as possible not to partner with sectarian organizations to now saying the government may not exclude an organization just because it's religious or because it teaches religion. We went from exclusion to full acceptance. That's a big change, and federal rules have had to be updated again and again to try to create a level playing field for all types of private organizations. But that push toward acceptance has been complicated recently by tension over LGBTQ issues. When religious exclusion happens today, it's often because rules have been put in place saying organizations that partner with the government have to have certain progressive views on LGBTQ issues. The organizations say that's not fair because their stance on LGBTQ issues stems from their religion, but there are officials out there who say it's discrimination. There's no solution yet for that. Policies on LGBTQ acceptance changed from Obama to Trump then from Trump to Biden and now from Biden to Trump. Kelsey: Your retirement comes at a time when the Trump administration is radically rethinking government funding programs. How are you feeling about the future? Stanley: The Trump administration has created uncertainly around the future of grant funding, which has created a whole new set of issues for faith-based organizations. They know they can participate in government funding programs, but they don't know if the funding programs are going to evaporate. From the beginning, myself and many others told religious organizations to be careful about how much money they took from any particular source, including the government. But now you see how reliant many groups became on government contracts. And part of that reliance involved letting the government dictate how programs were run, instead of being driven by creative ideas and spiritual values. It's a fraught time and a genuinely difficult time for many faith-based organizations, but I believe some good might come out of reform, since some funding relationships had become too static. I wish we could have taken a smoother path to reform that wouldn't have caused so much collateral damage, but the old status quo wasn't all that healthy in many ways. Fresh off the press The never-ending debate over the separation of church and state What to know about the white and black smoke used during a conclave How faith groups feel about the ethics of the Trump administration Will the Supreme Court accept religious charter schools? It may all come down to John Roberts Nike apologizes for using phrase associated with Holocaust in London Marathon ads The first-of-its-kind religious school exposing First Amendment tension Term of the week: First impression When used in regular life, the phrase 'first impression' refers to what stood out to you about a person when you first met them. But in the legal context, it refers to a new legal issue or question that wasn't addressed in the text of a law or in past rulings. Kim Davis, a former county clerk in Kentucky who rose to national prominence in 2015 when she refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, will soon appeal what some see as a first impression case to the Supreme Court. Davis is fighting a ruling that says she needs to pay damages to one of the couples who sought a marriage license from her 10 years ago. 'The case has raised the question of whether a government official sued in an individual capacity and stripped of governmental immunity may assert a personal First Amendment defense to monetary damages. By taking the case, SCOTUS can answer the question of 'first impression,' resolve any conflicts with Supreme Court precedent, and ensure that former government defendants standing before the Court in their personal capacity do not lose First Amendment protections,' Davis' law firm, Liberty Counsel, said in a press release last week. What I'm reading... A major new study on human flourishing seems to confirm the old adage that money can't buy happiness. Researchers found that 'poorer countries have higher scores for positive emotions, meaning and purpose, character and virtue, and social connection and relationships,' Christianity Today reported. A Ghanaian leader's cathedral dream quickly became a nightmare for the African country. The New York Times has the story. Religion News Service recently spent a few hours with Latter-day Saint women who have found a unique way to express their frustration with the Trump administration: creating quilts about the Constitution. Odds and ends The Deseret News is celebrating its 175th birthday on June 15. Go to to see our fancy new logo for the occasion — it's at the top of the page.
Yahoo
08-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
The impossible task of defining religion
This article was first published in the State of Faith newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Monday night. Earlier this year, I spoke with a college class about the relationship between religion and entertainment. I talked about my coverage of the movie 'Conclave,' the member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who was then competing on 'The Bachelor' and religion's role in the Olympics. But when it came time for the Q&A portion of my presentation, there weren't any questions about faith-related movies and shows. Instead, one of the students challenged me to talk more broadly about religion in American life. 'Who counts as religious?' he said. Based on my conversations with religion researchers over the years, I knew that was a doozy of a question. And so, I didn't really try to answer it. I just talked about how it works in surveys, which typically rely on people's self-identification. (In other words, researchers sort people into the 'religious' group if they describe themselves as 'religious.' It's a simple as that.) The student didn't challenge my response, but that didn't stop me from feeling a bit lame. The question of 'Who should count as religious?' has popped into my head several times since that presentation, and I've struggled to come up with a more definitive answer. I returned to that query again last week as the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case about faith-based tax breaks. As part of their effort to define the limits of religious exemptions, several justices reflected on how to define religion under the law. The justices, as well as the attorneys involved in the case, wrestled with whether the legal definition of religion should focus on sincerity of beliefs or a sense of duty to a higher power — or some combination of both. I got a kick out of a moment that Justice Amy Coney Barrett shared with attorney Eric Rassbach, who was arguing on behalf of the Catholic groups that brought the case. After asking Rassbach to articulate a line between religiosity and non-religiosity, Barrett said, 'It's kind of a big question, right?' As I took notes on the conversation, I nearly shouted, 'You can say that again!' Catholic Church announces 'painful' end to partnership with U.S. government. Here's why it matters Q&A: Meet the Latter-day Saint couple combatting religious stereotypes on reality TV The religious significance of Trump's tariffs How far can red states go to oppose Planned Parenthood? Supreme Court debates Medicaid restrictions Will Duke sue HBO over 'The White Lotus'? What it's like to attend church in space Wrestling Church is a unique event in the United Kingdom that's bringing people to religion — and to wrestling. Held in traditional religious spaces, the event enables regular churchgoers to learn more about the wrestling community and wrestlers to learn more about organized religion. It mixes prayer and faith-filled reflections with sweaty, loud wrestling matches. Gareth Thompson, founder of Kingdom Wrestling, the charity that leads the program, recently told The Associated Press that Wrestling Church grows out of his belief that both wrestling and a relationship with God can change your life. 'People say, 'Oh, wrestling and Christianity, they're two fake things in a fake world of their own existence,'' he said. 'If you don't believe in it, of course you will think that of it. But my own personal experience of my Christian faith is that it is alive and living, and it is true. The wrestling world, if you really believe in it, you believe that it's true and you can suspend your disbelief.' The Rev. Natasha Thomas, priest in charge at a church that's hosted several Wrestling Church events, told the AP that embracing the unique activity is a way to keep her church relevant at a time when less than half of English people now consider themselves Christian. 'It's not church as you would know it. It's certainly not for everyone,' she said. 'But it's bringing in a different group of people, a different community, than we would normally get.' As IVF becomes more accessible in the U.S., doctors, government officials and even religious leaders will need to spend more time thinking and talking about the ethics of preimplantation genetic screening, according to a recent New York Times column, which argued that the country is at risk of entering an era where we seek not just healthy babies, but optimized ones. The question often comes up when I'm talking to friends and colleagues: Is it time to quit social media? I'm not ready to log off sites like Facebook and X yet, but even I was shaken by a new American Storylines essay about the ways social media use can actually make us less social. Please make time in the week ahead to read Taffy Brodesser-Akner's beautiful essay for The New York Times Magazine about what we lose when we lose interest in learning about the Holocaust. My family checked an important task off our faith-related to-do list on Friday by going to a fish fry event at a local church. They're common fundraisers in our area of Wisconsin since several of our neighbors are Catholic and abstain from eating meat on Fridays during Lent.
