Summary of Remarks: “Religion’s Impact on World Issues and the Necessity of Freedom of Religion”

David H. Moore is Sterling and Eleanor Colton Endowed Chair in Law and Religion; Associate Director, International Center for Law and Religion Studies

Moore summarized the global impact of the pandemic and the role religion has played in responding to those challenges:

  • Physical health impacts from the pandemic causing untold infections and deaths. The World Health Organization has released statements on how treatments for HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis have stalled, hindered by the focused response to the pandemic.
  • Mental health impacts from the pandemic with effects of anxiety and depression.
  • Economic impacts include loss of jobs, disruption of supply chains contributing to inflation and debt burdens.
  • Increasing gender inequality in forced lockdowns and gender-based bias.
  • Development effects include lost progress on the UN Sustainable Development Goals on hunger, poverty, and education.

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The U.S. Supreme Court and Pandemic Restrictions on Religious Worship

Frederick Mark Gedicks is Guy Anderson Chair and Professor of Law in the J. Reuben Clark Law School at Brigham Young University

The current pandemic has presented challenges to normal life in the United States and elsewhere, including to the free exercise of religion. The U.S. Supreme Court has weighed in several times on COVID-related free exercise claims; though these are summary dispositions, they illuminate a doctrinal fault line that is likely to emerge in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia (3rdCir. 2019), a free-exercise case currently pending before the Court.

The Supreme Court’s Jurisprudence on Pandemic Restrictions

Employment Division v. Smith (1990) famously held that the First  Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion does not include the right of believers to be excused from complying with generally applicable laws that incidentally burden their religious beliefs or practices. Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. City of Hialeah (1993) clarified that Smith does not apply to laws which target religion with burdens from which comparable secular activities are relieved. Together, Smith and Lukumi transformed the free exercise of religion in the U.S. from a liberty to an equality right more consistent with the rule of law: believers are to be treated no better than other people, but also no worse.

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COVID-19 and Restrictions on Religious Institutions: Constitutional Implications

Kathleen A. Brady is Senior Fellow and McDonald Distinguished Fellow with the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University

When the dangers of COVID-19 first became apparent to the American public this past March, few churches resisted state and local lockdown orders that prohibited or severely limited in-person worship services. The potential for congregational gatherings to rapidly spread the virus was widely understood, and most religious believers probably anticipated a relatively short disruption. However, as the pandemic nears its seventh month and many jurisdictions retain substantial restrictions on in-person worship, many Americans are growing increasingly frustrated with limits that impinge upon core religious practices and undermine the spiritual, social and emotional goods that these practices nourish. It is not surprising, then, that litigation over restrictions on in-person worship has been increasing.

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