Several families have filed a federal lawsuit against numerous Obama administration officials and the Virginia (Minnesota) School District for permitting a sexually confused boy to confront half-naked girls in their locker rooms. After the girls and their parents complained, the school suggested they use a private room, but the boy follows them there repeatedly and harasses them by raising his dress and otherwise exposing himself.
"No student should be forced to use private facilities at school, like locker rooms and restrooms, with students of the opposite sex. No government agency should hold hostage important education funding to advance an unlawful agenda."
Alliance Defending Freedom [ADF] is fighting a Virginia, Minnesota school district. The conservative group filed a lawsuit on the behalf of 11 families who want to stop the allowance of the opposite sex in their children’s locker rooms, Fox News reports. The lawsuit named Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Virginia School District #706, and Secretary of Education John King Jr. as defendants.
The lawsuit filed said that a transgender student, only identified as Student X, used the female locker rooms and restrooms and participated on girl athletic teams. The ADF said that Student X violated some girls by twerking in their presence, dancing to suggestive songs, and making jokes about a girl’s bra size.
According to the lawsuit, girls who were uncomfortable with Student X were told they could use another locker room. One student, called Plaintiff A, said that she was told she could change in an empty boy’s locker room but Student X followed her in there. Plaintiff A said there was nowhere to go for privacy.
The ADF lawsuit explains that the [federal] DOE and DOJ are unlawfully redefining the terms of Title IX, something that only Congress can alter, and are illegitimately forcing their political will on all public schools across the nation. As the lawsuit points out, no federal law requires schools to allow boys into girls’ locker rooms or girls into boys’ locker rooms, and other courts have rejected the agencies’ interpretation to the contrary. The lawsuit also explains that the DOE did not comply with key provisions of the Administrative Procedure Act when it adopted its rules.
The complaint explains some of the real concerns of students and parents, such as when a biologically male student who identifies as a female—and who is allowed to enter the girls’ locker room under the district’s policy—went on to dance in the locker room “in a sexually explicit manner—‘twerking,’ ‘grinding’ and dancing like he was on a ‘stripper pole’ to songs with explicit lyrics, including ‘Milkshake’ by Kelis. On another occasion, a female student saw the male student lift his dress to reveal his underwear while ‘grinding’ to the music.”
"What these girls are asking for is something that for all of American history has been the common-sense presumption, that you have facilities for girls, facilities for boys and any student that is uncomfortable with that — including the transgender student at the heart of this case, (who) they're not uncompassionate to — they would think the best thing would be for this student to have the option to use the ... restroom of (the student's) biological sex or to make one of the single-stall restrooms available for (the student) to use," said Matt Sharp, an attorney with the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom, a religious legal advocacy nonprofit group.
The lawsuit seeks to have the district's policy and the federal guidance declared unlawful, and a permanent injunction issued against both. It also seeks "an award of nominal damages in the amount of one dollar, and compensatory damages" for each plaintiff, along with legal fees.
Virginia Superintendent Noel Schmidt declined to comment Thursday, and the school district's attorney, John Colosimo, couldn't be reached for comment.
Joanna Duka and Breanna Koski, owners of Brush & Nib Studio, have sued the city of Phoenix in Maricopa County (Arizona) Court over a new "gay rights" ordinance that restricts their freedom of religion to operate their calligraphy business, which includes wedding invitations, according to their Christian conscience (e.g.: marriage is the union of one man and one woman).
“Artists shouldn’t be threatened with jail for disagreeing with the government. The government must allow artists the freedom to make personal decisions about what art they will create and what art they won’t create.” -- Jeremy Tedesco, Senior Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)
For background, click headlines below to read how "gay rights," including same-sex "marriage," are inherently anti-Christian:
Lawyers for Brush & Nib, a calligraphy studio run by two Christian women who sell hand paintings and calligraphy for weddings and events, filed a lawsuit Thursday challenging the Phoenix LGBT non-discrimination ordinance. The city’s ordinance prohibits businesses from refusing service based on sexual orientation. The lawsuit claims this could be used to punish Brush & Nib by forcing them to service a same-sex ceremony, thus violating the owners’ consciences and religious freedoms. The business argues that since calligraphy is art, it should be considered free speech that cannot be censored or compelled by government.
“The Phoenix non-discrimination ordinance protects fundamental civil rights for everyone, and we will defend it aggressively,” Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton [who voted for the ordinance] said in a statement.
The lawsuit could reignite a fiery debate about the intersection of constitutional freedoms and Phoenix's ordinance prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. Opponents want the city's law overturned to allow business owners to deny service to LGBT people if it conflicts with their religious beliefs.
Duka and Koski directed a request for comment to their attorneys. Their representatives at the Alliance Defending Freedom said the plaintiffs cannot comment because they worry they could be violating the city's ordinance if they explain their desire not to do work for same-sex weddings.
Duka and Koski's lawsuit asks the court to declare the city's ordinance unconstitutional under the Arizona Constitution's Free Speech Clause and Religious Toleration Clause, among other areas of the law, so they and other artists can create art that "reflects their beliefs, not the government's."
The city ordinance says service cannot be denied due to sexual orientation. Violations are punishable by up to a $2,500 fine, six months in jail and three years probation for each day of violation. It also prevents businesses from displaying information about why they will refuse such service.
"Joanna and Breanna believe Jesus commanded Christians to love their neighbors no matter who they are, what they believe, or what they do," the complaint states. "To love their customers, Joanna and Breanna believe they must be upfront and honest with their customers and respectful toward their customers and their customers' time."
They say in the 86-page lawsuit that they do not object to selling artwork to customers of any background, except for same-sex marriages, because it violates their religious beliefs.
The City Council adopted the anti-discrimination ordinance in 2013 to stop discrimination against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender residents by privately owned businesses.
[ADF Senior Counsel Jeremy Tedesco said,] “Just because an artist creates expression that communicates one viewpoint doesn’t mean she is required to express all viewpoints. It’s unjust, unnecessary, and unlawful to force an artist to create against her will and intimidate her into silence.”
The lawsuit is known in legal circles as a “pre-enforcement challenge,” a lawsuit that allows citizens to challenge a law—in this case, a law that threatens First Amendment freedoms—before the government enforces it against them. Organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood routinely file such lawsuits against laws they oppose.
“Phoenix has already investigated another business for declining to promote a same-sex wedding ceremony for religious reasons and issued a formal report saying [the ordinance] requires businesses like Brush & Nib—those that create expression—to promote same-sex wedding ceremonies if they promote opposite-sex wedding ceremonies,” the ADF complaint explains.
“We simply value art too much to let Phoenix invade the artistic process as if Phoenix were regulating widgets…,” the ADF brief contends. “And make no mistake. Phoenix is playing favorites. It allows artists to speak and create in favor of same-sex marriage yet threatens to incarcerate artists if they speak or create only for opposite-sex marriage. We should all be concerned when the government tries to eradicate a particular idea by silencing adherents and forcing dissenters to profess orthodoxy. When the government manipulates the artistic marketplace and commandeers artists’ minds to squelch an idea, no idea is safe. Everyone eventually loses.”
They say they just want to go to the bathroom and take a shower in private!
Parents and students who formed North Carolinians for Privacy have filed a lawsuit in the Raleigh, North Carolina Federal Court to stop President Obama from using billions of taxpayer dollars to hold them hostage to his Gay/Transgender Agenda that demands men be permitted to use girls' restrooms and locker rooms.
"The [U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Education] must stop using falsehoods about what federal law requires to threaten student access to educational opportunities and financial assistance." -- Jeremy Tedesco, Senior Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)
The suit accuses the U.S. Department of Justice and Education of holding federal education money hostage.
The group, North Carolinians for Privacy, argues that federal law does not forbid sex-specific restrooms and that the federal government is bullying North Carolina by threatening to cut federal funding.
The issue of whether transgender people deserve the same federal protections extended to blacks and religious minorities is already before courts in North Carolina.
The Justice Department sued the state on Monday, asking a federal district court to rule that North Carolina was violating the 1964 Civil Rights Act [Title IX] and order it to stop enforcing [the state's new HB2 that provides privacy in restrooms].
North Carolina stands to lose $4.8 billion in funds, mainly educational grants, if it does not back down, according to an analysis by lawyers at the University of California, Los Angeles Law School.
As far as the plaintiffs [North Carolinians for Privacy] are concerned, the defendant departments [of education and justice] are making student aid and other educational funding contingent on students sharing restrooms and locker rooms with members of the opposite sex.
They claim the DOJ and education department have overstepped their authority in redefining sex and gender under Title IX, and that students' constitutional right to privacy would be violated if the state or the University of North Carolina were to bow to federal demands that transgender students be afforded full access to bathrooms that do not comport with the gender identified on their birth certificates.
The group is represented by Jeremy Tedesco, James Campbell, Kristen Waggoner, Joseph LaRue, and Jonathan Caleb Dalton of the Alliance Defending Freedom of Scottsdale, Arizona, David Cortman and J. Matthew Sharp of the Alliance's Lawrenceville, Georgia chapter, and by Deborah Dewart of the Liberty, Life and Law Foundation of Swansboro, North Carolina.
Attorneys representing 73 parents and 63 students in suburban Chicago filed a lawsuit this week against the Obama Administration and the largest high school district in Illinois for colluding to invade the privacy of students in the girls restrooms and locker rooms using new unlawful "transgender rights" edicts.
“It’s important to recognize that there’s a lagging legal framework in the face of rapidly changing social norms. Our understanding of gender identity is changing, and the law hasn’t kept up.” -- Francisco Negrón, National School Boards Association General Counsel "No school should impose a policy like this against the will of so many parents.” -- Vicki Wilson, Illinois parent and co-founder of Students and Parents for Privacy (lead plaintiff) “Allowing boys into girls’ locker rooms, a setting where girls are often partially or fully unclothed, is a blatant violation of student privacy. The school district should rescind its privacy-violating policies, and the court should order the Department of Education to stop bullying school districts with falsehoods about what federal law requires.” -- Jeremy Tedesco, Senior Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom “To impose such a rule on still-developing teenage girls, as they’re already struggling with puberty’s changes on their bodies and social pressures to look a certain way, undermines their dignity and tells them that their rights don’t matter. This isn’t a message our schools should be sending to our girls.” -- Jocelyn Floyd, Attorney, Thomas More Society
Lawyers for Alliance Defending Freedom and Thomas More Society, two conservative groups, filed the 77-page suit Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Chicago on behalf of 51 families with links to Palatine-based Township High School District 211. It names the district and the U.S. Department of Education as defendants.
The battle for access to girls' facilities at William Fremd High School by the transgender student — who was born male but identifies as female — helped spark a national debate last year that has since spread to other districts.
The [new transgender] policy, [the lawsuit] says, causes other girls fear and embarrassment. It adds: They are "afraid they will have to see a male in a state of undress," which, for some, is a "distraction throughout the school day." One girl's anxiety led her to wear gym clothes under her street clothes so she can peel just the outer clothes off in the locker.
A group of Illinois students and parents sued the Obama administration Wednesday over its stance on transgender students’ access to school bathrooms and locker rooms, arguing that the U.S. Education Department is illegally forcing local authorities to let children use facilities that correspond to their gender identity.
The complaint alleges that the federal government has violated students’ fundamental right to privacy and parents’ constitutional right to instill moral standards and values in their children.
The lawsuit represents the first legal challenge to the Obama administration’s interpretation of Title IX, a federal anti-discrimination law, as providing transgender students with the right to use the bathroom that matches their gender identity instead of their biological sex.
Palatine officials — facing the loss of $6 million in federal funding — ultimately decided to allow a transgender student to change in the girls locker room instead of sending her down the hall to a separate facility.
Students and Parents for Privacy and three female students sued the U.S. Department of Education, Secretary of Education John King, the Department of Justice, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Cook County, Ill., and the directors of Township High School District 211 in Illinois Federal Court on Wednesday.
"This is a civil rights action to stop the Department of Education and Township High School District 211 from continuing to trample students' privacy and other constitutional and statutory rights by forcing 14- to 17-year-old girls to use locker rooms and restrooms with biological males; and to set aside DOE's ultra vires legislative rule redefining 'sex' in Title IX to include gender identity," the 83-page complaint begins.
"This creates an intimidating and hostile environment for the girl members of Students and Parents for Privacy, some of whom are as young as 14, because Student A - who is biologically a male - actively uses their private facilities at the same times as plaintiffs," the complaint states. "As a direct result of defendants' policies and actions, every day these girls go to school, they experience embarrassment, humiliation, anxiety, fear, apprehension, stress, degradation, and loss of dignity because they will have to use the locker room and restroom with a biological male."
The District 211 transgender student, who has not been identified publicly, initially filed a complaint with the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights alleging that the district discriminated against [Student A] when it denied [him] access to the girls locker room. The district had previously allowed the student to use the girls restroom.
In an unprecedented decision, federal education authorities found that the district had violated Title IX. The district risked losing millions of federal dollars and a possible lawsuit by the federal government if it failed to reach a resolution. In a controversial decision, the district agreed in December to allow the student locker room access and installed privacy stalls. Proponents of the settlement heralded it as a civil rights victory.
The religious liberty group Thomas More Society also is representing the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which seeks to keep the district from enforcing the locker room agreement and restroom policy and to bar the Department of Education from taking action against the district. The plaintiffs also argue in the suit that the locker room agreement prevents students from practicing the modesty that their faith requires of them.
The lawsuit, Students and Parents for Privacy v. United States Department of Education, seeks an injunction against District 211. Headquartered in Palatine, it serves nearly 12,500 students from Palatine, Hoffman Estates, Inverness, Schaumburg and parts of seven other northwest suburbs in five high schools and two alternative high schools.
It also asks the court to declare the policy and the district’s agreement with the Department of Education unconstitutional and illegal under both federal and Illinois law, and to have the court invalidate the department’s interpretation of Title IX’s sex discrimination provisions.
District 211 Supt. Dan Cates said Wednesday that the district affirms and supports the identity of all its students and will stand by the highly publicized agreement it reached last December with the department’s Office for Civil Rights. . . .
“We have implemented the agreement without any reports of incident or issue,” Cates said. “Our students have shown acceptance, support and respect of each other. Individual changing stalls in our locker rooms are readily available to every student and further accommodations that provide even greater privacy remain available upon request.”
The divisive and politically combustible issue of bathroom access for transgender individuals is about to become further inflamed, as the Obama administration is expected in coming weeks to aggressively reinforce its position that transgender student rights are fully protected under federal law, sources told POLITICO.
With the Justice Department already locking horns with North Carolina over the state’s so-called bathroom bill, the administration plans to reaffirm its view that robust protections for transgender students are within the existing scope of Title IX, a federal law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded education programs and activities. Multiple agencies are expected to be involved.
New guidance on Title IX represents a natural outgrowth of the administration’s aggressive agenda on gender equity and civil rights. In April 2014, guidance issued by the Education Department on sexual violence explicitly mentioned that transgender students are protected under Title IX. LGBT advocates saw it as an important moment for the transgender community, but have wanted the administration to go even further in clarifying the law.
In two unrelated court cases, judges dealt blows yesterday to the abortion industry. A federal judge in Detroit dismissed an attempt by the ACLU to force Catholic hospitals to perform abortions, and a judge in Illinois upheld the First Amendment rights of a pro-life organization to distribute fliers exposing the gruesome business of dumping babies in landfills.
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
Detroit federal Judge Gershwin Drain says the American Civil Liberties Union and its members have no standing to sue Trinity Health Corp. In a 13-page decision Monday, he said the ACLU failed to explain what medical conditions would place their members at risk or if they are currently at risk.
The judge says any harm is "speculative."
An attorney for Trinity, Kevin Theriot, says no one should be forced to perform abortions. The ACLU says it's considering its next step.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of its members last year, calling for an injunction against the anti-abortion policies of Trinity Health Corporation, a Livonia-based health care group with 90 hospitals that adhere to directives of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
ACLU lawyers pointed specifically to one member who was denied abortion procedures at a Trinity hospital despite suffering "emergency complications during her pregnancy that required the termination of her pregnancy in order to stabilize her condition."
The lawsuit also argued that other pregnant members were "at risk of suffering similar harm should their pregnancies suffer complications in the future."
In his ruling, [Judge] Drain said the ACLU did not provide enough specific proof of harm to its members to give the organization standing to sue.
“Therefore, even assuming that the complaint contains sufficient factual matter to establish past actual harm — considering the vagueness of the allegation, this is dubious — the allegations of past exposure to defendants’ illegal conduct is not sufficient to create standing,” he wrote.
Alliance Defending Freedom [ADF] attorneys represent the Catholic Medical Association, the Christian Medical and Dental Associations, and the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which the court allowed on March 10 to intervene in the case in defense of Trinity Health Corporation. Trinity Health operates 86 facilities in 21 states.
“No American should be forced to commit an abortion—least of all faith-based medical workers who went into the profession to follow their faith and save lives, not take them,” said ADF Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot. “No law requires religious hospitals and medical personnel to commit abortions against their faith and conscience, and, in fact, federal law directly prohibits the government from engaging in any such coercion. As we argued in our brief to the court, the ACLU had no standing to bring this suit and demand this kind of government coercion.”
“Those who doubt that anyone would ever try to force someone to commit an abortion need only look at this case,” explained ADF Senior Counsel Matt Bowman. “This is precisely what the ACLU sought to do. The court came to the right conclusion in putting an end to their quest. The ruling relies on important case law that our pro-life medical group clients cited showing that the ACLU’s case was based on pure speculation.”
“Forcing health care workers to act contrary to the very faith and ethical convictions that led them into the medical profession—to serve, help, and bring healing to people—is counterproductive, unnecessary, and against the law,” Bowman continued.
Lake County [Illinois] Associate Judge Margaret Marcouiller ruled Monday that the Ohio-based group Created Equal can keep distributing fliers that show pictures of an aborted fetus and a Lake Forest [Illinois] resident, and also include the executive's home address.
The fliers have been left with neighbors of Charles Alutto, who heads Stericycle, a medical waste company.
Created Equal says Stericycle "enables baby killing" by transporting medical waste from a Planned Parenthood facility in Ohio
Marcouiller said Monday that "even insulting and outrageous speech must be tolerated."
Created Equal Executive Director Mark Harrington called the court ruling a victory and said the campaign, which includes fliers, mobile billboards and postcards, will continue.
"If Stericycle wants to stop our awareness campaign, they simply need to cease transporting and disposing of aborted babies for Planned Parenthood," Harrington said.
Despite denying the emergency order, the judge said she will take up the issue again and gave the plaintiffs two weeks to update and resubmit their complaint.
Stericycle's “regulated medical waste acceptance policy” states that the company does not accept “complete human remains (including heads, full torsos, and fetuses).”
Mark Harrington, the national director of Created Equal says the company is playing a game of semantics.
“However, babies are not 'complete' after being dismembered, decapitated, and disemboweled in standard abortion methods,” Harrington said. “Their broken parts and torn tissue are categorized by Stericycle as 'pathological waste,'” which the company willingly transports.
He wrote a letter to Alutto on February 10 with a sample flier that would be handed out in his community to raise awareness of Stericycle's actions. It included Alutto's home address and business phone number. If the company would stop providing services to abortionists, Harrington said, he would not go forward with the campaign.
Jim and Beth Walder, the owners of Timber Creek Bed & Breakfast near Paxton, Illinois, have been fined $80,000 by the state Human Rights Commission after being singled out in 2011 by homosexual men demanding their same-sex ceremony be officiated in the Walder's facility. The Commission ordered the Walders to "cease and desist" from quoting the Bible to same-sex couples and welcome ceremonies of abomination in their facility in accordance with the Human Rights Act and pay the homosexuals $30,000 plus another $50,000 to the ACLU for legal fees.
"To be absolutely clear, we cannot host a same-sex wedding even though fines and penalties have been imposed by the Illinois Human Rights Commission. Our policy will not be changing. . . . We are not looking for a fight, but when immoral laws are purposely passed (or deemed constitutional) that blatantly conflict with God's Word and when the heavy hand of government tries to force us as Christians to embrace sinful behavior, we have a moral obligation to resist and stand for Biblical truth: 'It is better to obey God than men.' Acts 5:29." -- Jim Walder
[Michael R. Robinson, an] administrative law judge with the [Illinois] commission ordered TimberCreek Bed & Breakfast to pay $15,000 each to Todd and Mark Wathen for emotional distress.
TimberCreek, located about 100 miles south of Chicago, must also pay $50,000 in attorneys' fees and $1,218.35 in costs.
The Wathens had contacted TimberCreek in 2011 as they looked for possible locations for the ceremony.
TimberCreek owner Jim Walder had responded to the Wathens' inquiry with an email that said "homosexuality is immoral and unnatural," according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois.
In September, [Judge] Robinson ruled that Jim Walder violated the civil rights of the Wathens when he denied them the opportunity to hold their civil-union ceremony at the B&B he co-owns with his wife — the TimberCreek Bed-and-Breakfast west of Paxton.
The landmark ruling marked the first time that the Human Rights Commission made clear that businesses in Illinois must serve the entire public and cannot pick and choose based on their personal religious views.
Following a public hearing held last November in Springfield to consider damages to be awarded to the couple, ACLU attorneys for the Wathens filed briefs to support the couple's request for a "cease and desist" order and for Walder to pay damages for emotional distress, attorneys' fees and costs. Lawyers for the B&B failed to respond in a timely matter, leading to the judge's ruling.
The Wathens said they never contacted another B&B [other than Walder's]. They ended up being wed in a small ceremony on June 4, 2011, in their back yard . . .
Walder said in an emailed statement Tuesday that his B&B will not host civil-union ceremonies or same-sex weddings, regardless of last week’s ruling.
“Evidently, religious freedom does not exist within the Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act or the Illinois Religious Freedom and Marriage Fairness Act.
“In our opinion, neither the state of Illinois nor the U.S. Supreme Court has the authority to tamper with the definition of marriage. God alone created marriage and declared thousands of years ago that it was to be between a man and a woman. Not two men. Not two women. We may be out of step with an increasingly anti-Christian culture, but we are in compliance with God’s design, and that is what ultimately matters.”
University of Illinois law Professor Robin Wilson, an expert on the intersection of religious freedom and same-sex marriage, said the penalties the state could impose upon TimberCreek Bed-and-Breakfast owner Jim Walder include placing a lien on his personal estate.
"Every time he refuses," Wilson said, "the state can fine him again."
If Walder opts to fight the state ruling, Wilson said, he must file an appeal within 14 days. Since it was made by a single judge, Walder could request a rehearing by either a three-person panel or the full commission within 30 days. If six of the 13 commissioners grant a rehearing, the original order is nullified, pending the results of the rehearing.
If that doesn't go well, Walder "can jump right back over to the appellate court," Wilson said. In either case, though, "he's got hanging around his neck factual findings that they are going to assume are true," she said.
We politely disagree. God is not confused. His Word clearly illustrates and declares that marriage is between one man and one woman. It also labels homosexuality as an abominable sin throughout the Old and New Testaments. God's Word is the ultimate authority, infallible, and unchanging. It is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His Word cannot be changed by a vote of the Illinois General Assembly when it passed the Civil Unions Act or the Gay Marriage Bill. Marriage is only appropriate God's way. Sexuality is only appropriate God's way.
Consequently, we cannot host civil unions or gay marriages at TimberCreek Bed & Breakfast. It is not an issue of fairness or equality, but an issue of right and wrong. We cannot be part of what God condemns. Be assured that we are not lawless, hateful, judgmental, bigoted, or activists by any definition. We did not initiate the present controversy. We are not the ones who voted to change the 6,000 year-old definition of marriage. We are just small business owners trying to be consistent in following God's Word and living it out practically in our lives. And we are not alone. . . .
A Missouri judge has ruled in favor of the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City–St. Joseph in a summary judgment order regarding the case of lesbian Colleen Simon suing for being fired in May 2014 from the St. Francis Xavier Parish food pantry for espousing her same-sex "marriage," which the Diocese said "contradicts Church laws, discipline, and teaching and the diocesan Policy on Ethics and Integrity in Ministry."
Terms of the settlement with Colleen Simon, a former church food pantry worker, were not disclosed. But the settlement came two days after a Jackson County judge threw out her fraud claim against the church but declined to throw out two other claims alleging violations of Missouri’s service letter statute and Missouri’s minimum wage law.
Jack Smith, a spokesman for the diocese, said the church “just decided to settle” on those other counts.
E.E. Keenan and Sonal Bhatia, the husband-and-wife team who represented Simon, said the parties had resolved the case “to their mutual satisfaction.”
[Judge] Garrett said that inquiring into that claim “would impermissibly entangle the Court in matters and decisions purely canonical, since the Court must necessarily examine the religious views and practices of the Diocese in an attempt to perceive the reasonableness of Plaintiff’s reliance on the Diocese’s representations.”
The court ruled that the First Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion means the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City–St. Joseph is free to make its employment decisions without court interference. Alliance Defending Freedom [ADF] attorneys representing the diocese filed a motion for summary judgment last year asking for this result.
“A church isn’t obligated to employ those who act contrary to the church’s teachings. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed this as recently as four years ago,” said ADF Senior Counsel Erik Stanley. “The district court was on very firm constitutional ground to reject this attempt to drag the government into a church’s theological decisions – the very line the First Amendment says the government cannot cross.”
“If churches are forced to employ people who do not follow the religious teachings of those churches, the church will no longer be able to minister consistently or freely in accordance with its faith,” added ADF Legal Counsel Jeremiah Galus.
Colleen Simon alleges in her lawsuit that she had told two priests at St. Francis Xavier Church that she was married to another woman and they had informed her that her sexual orientation would not be a problem.
However, an April [2014] article in The Kansas City Star’s 816 news magazine mentioned her marriage to the Rev. Donna Simon of St. Mark Hope and Peace Lutheran Church. Within a month, Colleen Simon had been fired at [Bishop Robert J.] Finn’s direction, she alleges.
She said the church fraudulently encouraged her to take the food pantry position at St. Francis Xavier in July 2013, knowing the diocese had no intention of keeping its commitments to her.
Colleen Simon alleges in her lawsuit that she mentioned her sexual orientation to the priest at St. Francis Xavier during a job interview in May 2013. The priest purportedly “was nonplussed, and expressed no objection to Ms. Simon’s sexual orientation or her relationship with Donna,” the suit alleges.
The plaintiff and Donna Simon were married in Iowa, as same-sex marriages are illegal in Missouri.
During a face-to-face interview, Simon says, she told the first pastor that she and her wife were "well known in the community, and were known to be an open, out, married couple in the community."
In January 2014, after the pastor who had interviewed her moved away, Simon says she revealed her sexual orientation to the new pastor of St. Francis Xavier, who "looked surprised. He said 'Oh, okay. It's okay.'"
Simon says the pastor of St. Francis Xavier [later] emailed her, expressing concern about the information in the [Kansas City Star] article, and also called the reporter and "asked [her] if she was a Catholic, and when the reporter answered that she was not, the new pastor stated to her that she didn't know what she had done."
"The new pastor stated that now that Ms. Simon's marital status was public, he had no choice but to ask her to submit a letter of resignation," the complaint states.
In late June [2014], the diocesan Human Resources Director Bob Roper informed Simon of her dismissal from her position at St. Francis Xavier.
Provided to CP by Diocese Director of Communications Jack Smith, the letter explained that she was being terminated for being involved in a gay marriage.
"The reason … was based upon an irreconcilable conflict between the laws, discipline, and teaching of the Catholic Church and your relationship — formalized by an act of marriage in Iowa — to a person of the same-sex," wrote Roper to Simon.
A representative of Simon provided The Christian Post with a copy of the lawsuit, filed in Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri, at the Independence Courthouse.
. . . [Simon's demands] according to the suit, include "all economic loss, including unpaid wages and fringe benefit; nominal and/or statutory damages for violation of the Missouri Service Letter Law; the costs of this action; and any other and further legal and/or equitable relief that this court deems just and proper."
Women's Health Link is appealing a federal district court decision that allows the Fort Wayne Public Transportation Corp. to deny the women's health organization from advertising on Citilink public buses because the ads "express or advocate opinions or positions upon political, religious, or moral issues."
"Women's Health Link hasn't shown that Citilink's advertising policy was anything other than reasonable and viewpoint neutral." -- Judge Robert L. Miller Jr.
Women's Health Link filed the lawsuit in September 2014, alleging Citilink violated its constitutional rights, specifically the First and 14th amendments, by refusing to display an advertisement/public service announcement for its free referral service for women seeking "life-affirming health care related services."
[Judge] Miller also said, "Citilink has a detailed advertising policy limiting advertising in its buses to commercial advertisements and public service announcements that comply with the restrictions set out in section 1 of that policy and don't 'express or advocate opinions or positions upon political, religious, or moral issues,' and so far as this record shows, Citilink has consistently enforced that policy."
Kevin Theriot, Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel, said, "City officials can't run ads from non-profit groups, such as the United Way, and then single out Women's Health Link's nearly identical ad for censorship. The First Amendment protects freedom of speech for all people, regardless of their political or religious views. Because government has a responsibility to ensure equal access to community advertising, we have filed this appeal and hope the 7th Circuit [Court of Appeals in Chicago] will reverse District Court's decision."
The case began in 2013 when Women’s Health Link asked to place advertising cards in the interior of the city public transportation company Citilink’s buses, LifeNews previously reported. Citilink denied the request twice, saying that Women’s Health Link is associated with Allen County Right to Life, a pro-life organization, and that the Women’s Health Link website discusses “controversial issues.”
Citilink reportedly has permitted many non-profit and government organizations to place public service announcements with various messages in the interior of their buses, including the state of Indiana, Parkview Health and the United Way.
According to court documents, the 11-by-17-inch ad would cost $524 for three months and says "You are not alone" and "Free resources for women seeking health care" on either side of the smiling face of a young woman, with the organization's website and telephone number on a banner below.
Citilink officials rejected the proposed ad on two occasions, saying their attorneys believed that the organization's website dealt with "controversial issues," according to court documents.
The woman who submitted the advertisement on behalf of Women's Health Link [Beck Rogness] was on the organization's board of directors and also was communications manager for Allen County Right to Life, according to court documents.
Women's Health Link and Allen County Right to Life share email addresses and a physical address.
The Women’s Health Link site promotes itself as a referral resource “for women seeking physical, emotional, spiritual or mental health care.”
. . . [Citilink’s assistant manager, Betsy] Kachmar notified Rogness that the ad failed to meet the “commercial requirement” of the agency.
So the request was resubmitted under the agency’s provision for “public service announcements by government entities, academic institutions, or nonprofit organizations.”
[However, under that provision, the] agency contended the women’s health care ad was not neutral.
A group of students at Glendo (Wyoming) High School that gathered in a corner of the cafeteria to quietly pray together was told to stop it, and Principal Stanetta Twiford instructed the students to conceal themselves elsewhere in the building in order to comply with an ACLU legal opinion concerning visible prayer in schools. However, after the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) threatened to sue Platte County School District #1 for this unconstitutional prohibition, Superintendent Dennis Fischer acquiesced.
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
In October, some students formed a prayer circle in Glendo High School’s cafeteria. Administrators say a parent lunch monitor and the school principal told the students to pray elsewhere because of concerns about separation of church and state.
But Superintendent Dennis Fischer says—after consulting the district’s attorney—he found that the lunchroom prayer was appropriate and within students’ rights provided under federal law.
Last week, the district sent a letter to Alliance Defending Freedom, informing the group that the incident had been dealt with. Fischer says school staff are now better informed about students' right to pray.
The group Alliance Defending Freedom says that the principal of Glendo High School, with a population of only 50 or so students, had prevented a group of 7 students from praying over their meals in the cafeteria.
The ADF says, they were contacted by a local pastor. They sent a letter to the school demanding that the “ban” on prayer be lifted. Here is how they phrased it in their press release…
“No student should be prevented from engaging in private prayer alone or quietly with other students on campus,” said ADF Legal Counsel Jonathan Scruggs. “The U.S. Supreme Court has weighed in on this specifically. The First Amendment protects the right to pray in a non-disruptive manner not just in private but in public, too. The district has done the right thing in lifting its unconstitutional ban.”
A small group of students at Platte County School District #1 created a prayer circle [that was led by the children of Pastor Marty Roark] in the cafeteria of Glendo High School to pray for their meal on October 15. The students prayed audibly, and it was not part of a regularly scheduled group. Afterward, the students say Principal Stanetta Twiford accosted one of the students and accused the student of forcing their religion on other students.
The principal allegedly said students needed permission to pray and then must go in the hallway or gymnasium if they wanted to talk to God. That way, other students wouldn’t see the prayer. The school argued the students were a captive audience being forced to witness the prayer. The father of two of the students appealed to the principal, who stood firm on the rule.
“School cafeterias are not religion-free zones, and they certainly do not involve captive audiences,” ADF said in a letter letter to the district. “Students in the cafeteria are not captive audiences because they can leave at any time or turn away from the quiet prayer in the corner…”
The Roark children and one of their friends told the pastor about the principal not letting them pray in the cafeteria during lunch. Roark then sent [Principal] Twiford information explaining that children had the legal right to pray during lunch.
A few days later when Roark saw Twiford at a school basketball game, he asked her if the students would be allowed to pray. Twiford again rejected the request and said allowing them to pray in the cafeteria would force other students to be a "captive audience."
Roark then left messages for Platte County School District Superintendent Dennis Fischer, who responded by citing the American Civil Liberties Union [ACLU] in stating that Twiford was right to stop the prayer gatherings in the cafeteria because it would have "compelled other students to participate."
After the school district's refusal to let the students pray in the cafeteria during lunch, Roark contacted the Alliance Defending Freedom, which sent a demand letter on Dec. 4 to Fischer, Twiford and the school district's attorney stating that the school has two weeks to allow the students to pray or it would consider filing a lawsuit against the school district.
A religious liberty attorney representing a Kentucky Christian family has complained to the Johnson County School District about its decision to delete all Biblical references from the play "A Charlie Brown Christmas" at W.R. Castle Elementary School in Wittensville. The district's attorney and state officials recommended the censorship after a lone complaint.
“And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night, and lo the angel of the Lord came upon them and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were sore afraid, and the angel said unto them, ‘Fear not, for behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a savior, tis Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you. You shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger.’ And suddenly, there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on Earth peace, good will toward men.’ . . . That’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.”. -- Character Linus Van Pelt, from the play
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
Principal Jeff Cochran said all Biblical references were removed from the play after receiving a message Friday from Superintendent Thomas Salyer.
Salyer told the newspaper Tuesday that Christmas programs across the district were being reviewed for possible modifications of religious references after receiving a complaint.
Salyer says he made his decision based upon the advice of his attorney and state officials.
Salyer said that district officials had received a complaint about religious references in Christmas programs at schools. But he said for “confidentiality reasons” he would not confirm media reports that the complaint originated at Castle Elementary.
CNN reported last month that Linus’ recitation of the Bible passages was also at issue in the development of the 1965 animated television special “A Charlie Brown Christmas.”
Peanuts creator Charles Schulz wanted to include the speech, CNN reported, but the producers were hesitant. After much back and forth, the passage was left in, the network said.
Matt Sharp, an attorney with the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom, said it was contacted by and is now representing Joey Collins, whose daughter is a cast member in the play that is scheduled for Thursday at W.R. Castle Elementary School.
“There is no violation of the so-called ‘separation of church and state’ by allowing children to learn about theater and the origins of Christmas through participating in a stage version of this beloved program that contains the same religious elements as the television version,” the letter Sharp sent to the district on Tuesday said. “. . . Given that courts have consistently held that schools may organize and sponsor Christmas programs and performances that include religious songs and study the historical origins of Christmas, there is no basis for the district’s decision to censor the religious aspects of ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas.’”
Meanwhile, Sharp said that his recommendations to school district officials are “constitutional.”
“We would even be willing to help the school district if the school district was sued” for putting the religious content back in the play, he said.
"The Supreme Court has consistently held that schools can teach about religion, and can use the Bible as a resource in curricular programs," ADF Legal Counsel Matt Sharp said. "So, when the issue has come up with Christmas programs, {The U.S. Supreme Court has} held that you can sing 'Silent Night' as part of a Christmas program, or include biblical references."
"They're losing all of these great works of classic western culture, of the musical impact and of being able to understand how the bible has influenced Shakespeare and 'Moby Dick' and all of these other things," Sharp said.
“Schools should not have to think twice about whether they can allow students to perform a classic Christmas production simply because it contains biblical references,” said Sharp in a press release. “‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’ has become an iconic Christmas story and tradition. Are school officials going to start demanding that other classic productions, such as Shakespearean plays, be censored just because they contain religious references?”
Three churches are suingMichelle Rouillard, the director of the California Department of Managed Health Care (DMHC), in federal court for First Amendment violations of requiring churches to pay for surgical abortions via the ObamaCare-forced employer health insurance. Last year, the DMHC reclassified abortion as a “basic health service,” thus mandating all heath insurance coverage to include elective abortion as if it's a medical ailment.
“Because Obamacare requires health insurance coverage, and the California mandate requires abortion coverage in any health plan, these churches are truly left with no way to opt out of paying for abortions. What’s absurd, though, is that the same government that rightfully does not require California churches to pay for contraceptive coverage requires them to pay for elective abortion coverage.” -- Jeremiah Galus, Litigation Staff Counsel (for the churches) of Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
The California DMHC stated in an August 2014 letter to seven insurance companies that they were required to include elective abortions in their health plans with no exceptions. The letter came in response to complaints after Santa Clara University and Loyola Marymount University excluded elective abortion from their employee insurance policies on religious grounds.
The letter cites California’s Constitution and the 1975 Knox-Keene Health Care Service Plan Act, which “requires the provision of basic health care services” in justification of their abortion mandate.
The lawsuit states that the churches have been searching for a way to “provide health insurance coverage to their employees in a way that does not also cause them to pay for abortions,” as they believe that “abortion kills an innocent human life.”
The lawsuit also charges that the DMHC “realizing that Plaintiffs and others have sincerely held religious beliefs against paying for or providing coverage for abortion,” still “encouraged the insurers to hide these changes by informing them that they may ‘omit any mention of coverage for abortion services in health plan documents.’”
ADF filed the lawsuit, Foothill Church v. Rouillard, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California on behalf of Foothill Church in Glendora, Calvary Chapel Chino Hills in Chino, and The Shepherd of the Hills Church in Porter Ranch.
Last year, ADF and Life Legal Defense Foundation filed formal complaints with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services against DMHC regarding California’s mandate and its violation of federal conscience law. Those came on the heels of a complaint filed directly with DMHC, which responded by affirming its decision to force all plans to cover all abortions without any explanation as to how that decision squares with the Constitution and contrasting federal law.
The complaint explains, “DMHC is an arm of the State of California and purports to be interpreting and applying the law of California, a state that receives billions of taxpayer dollars…. California accepted those funds with full knowledge of the requirements of the Weldon Amendment, but it has chosen to ignore this law. The need to remedy this discrimination is urgent because it is immediately depriving Complainants of a health plan that omits elective abortions.”
“The DMHC created this abortion mandate in response to political pressure from the abortion lobby,” said LLDF Legal Director Catherine Short. “DMHC would have us believe that, while the Legislature exempted these churches from the state’s contraceptive coverage mandate, it nonetheless intended to force them to cover all abortions under the rubric of ‘basic health care.’ This move was a pure power play, and we trust that the Department of Health and Human Services will take the necessary steps to bring the state into compliance with federal law.”
“Forcing a church to be party to elective abortion is one of the utmost-imaginable assaults on our most fundamental American freedoms,” said ADF Senior Counsel Casey Mattox. “California is flagrantly violating the federal law that protects employers from being forced into having abortion in their health insurance plans. No state can blatantly ignore federal law and think that it should continue to receive taxpayer money.”
Evidence that Rouillard was specifically targeting churches, the complaint says, was demonstrated by the fact that the mandate “does not apply to health benefit plans offered by the California Public Employees Retirement System and other policies.”
“Defendant imposed the mandate with full knowledge that it would coerce religious employers and churches like plaintiffs to violate their sincerely held religious beliefs.”
[The complaint] cites violations of the First Amendment and creates a pages-long list of damages, including chilling religious exercise, a government-imposed coercion regarding religious beliefs and exposing the plaintiffs them to damages and penalties.
“Defendant issued the mandate to suppress the religious exercise of plaintiffs and other similarly situated churches and religious employers,” it states.
