Supreme Court: CA Can't Ban Indoor Church Services, Even to Prevent COVID Spread

[hurl]

From Hemant Mehta

In a decision released late last night, the Supreme Court ruled that California has no right to ban indoor church gatherings even in parts of the state where COVID cases are surging, though they may limit attendance to 25% capacity.

That means some of the largest churches in the state will be permitted to open its doors to hundreds, if not thousands, of people well before everyone has received the vaccine, to gather close to each other for hours at a time and spread the virus faster than they could ever spread the Gospel. The rationale is that churches are comparable to other places that have opened to the public — like shopping malls. Even though when people shop, they can enter and leave quickly without chatting with other people in close proximity.
...
Justice Elena Kagan, speaking for the Court’s three remaining liberals, was blunt in her dissent:

Justices of this Court are not scientists. Nor do we know much about public health policy. Yet today the Court displaces the judgments of experts about how to respond to a raging pandemic. The Court orders California to weaken its restrictions on public gatherings by making a special exception for worship services. The majority does so even though the State’s policies treat worship just as favorably as secular activities (including political assemblies) that, according to medical evidence, pose the same risk of COVID transmission. Under the Court’s injunction, the State must instead treat worship services like secular activities that pose a much lesser danger. That mandate defies our caselaw, exceeds our judicial role, and risks worsening the pandemic.

more at link
https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/02/06/supreme-court-ca-cant-ban-indoor-church-services-even-to-prevent-covid-spread/



I'm sure the Biden/Harris administration is working on a plan for court reform, hope it comes soon.

[abqtommy]

1. Well, at least giving the state the right to limit capacity to 25% is a step toward limiting

religious "freedumb".

[RKP5637]

3. Let the idiots go, as long as they keep it among themselves. n/t

[Raven123]

8. Therein is the problem

They wonder keep it to themselves and when they get sick, will expose health care workers to be exposed unnecessarily

[RKP5637]

13. Absolute idiots!!! n/t

[Rick Rolle]

2. I'm not a church person

In fact, I'm rather agnostic, but I don't have a problem with people going to church. If someone chooses to freely associate with other people, even if they risk contracting a potentially fatal disease, then they are willing to accept the consequences. I know people who believe that an invisible man in the sky will protect them from everything, if they prove themselves worthy, and if He doesn't protect them then they accept that they are not worthy. Either way, they believe their God will take care of them. in this instance, I'm rooting for the virus.

[stopbush]

4. You ignore the fact that a pandemic thrives when people become

infected in one place and then carry that infection elsewhere. You seem to imagine that the only people at risk of getting sick by attending church services are those who physically attended said services, that any infection picked up at church will stay within the boundaries of the church and the bodies of those who attended. Not science. Not the way it works.

[RKP5637]

5. Yep, LOL, they can pray the virus away. n/t

[kacekwl]

6. If these "churches" don't want to cooperate with government rules then

possibly it's time to start talks to eliminate tax exempt status for them.

[BComplex]

10. It's way past time that churches keep getting away with influencing politics and don't have to pay

taxes.

[RKP5637]

14. Definitely!!! I'm so fed up with hearing the god or jesus word invoked for special privileges and

whatever.

[deminks]

7. The majority, or their clerks at least, need to learn to use Google or any other search engine.

They are not scientists, nor are they historians, evidently. Do these old boozing rich guys and their handmaiden know that they are here on this earth because of what their boards of health did in 1918? and yes, church services were banned for a short period of time in the second wave in 1918. This was before teevee, radio, and the inter tubes. Church services were one of the primary social events back then. Ministers and believers found ways to worship at home through newspapers, mostly. We have so many options now. Granted, this virus is not seasonal like the flu. It was stopped by masks, distancing, and limiting social gatherings. Much more so than now.

Read, god damn you SCOTUS. Quit killing the people for the sake of the Koch brother.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/03/health/churches-covid-1918-lesson-wellness/index.html

https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/flu-epidemic-of-1918/17805

/rant off.

[Ferrets are Cool]

9. I lost all compassion for these idiots long ago.

And common decency will not allow me to say what I hope happens to every last one of them that enters those buildings.

[davsand]

11. States CAN decide to tax that real estate.

If those churches insist on opening up in the middle of a public health crisis it would certainly seem to be in the state's right (and best interests) to levy property taxes on those churches for adding to the burden of public health departments and other taxing bodies. If state legislatures have the political willpower to incorporate it into state laws that any church that violates public health orders will be forced to pay tax on the real estate to reimburse the added costs to the public, including schools, governments, and public health departments, that might "slow their holy roll" just a little bit.

Just sayin...


Laura

[Initech]

12. Elections have consequences.

[keithbvadu2]

15. Can the attendees be required to sign a waiver?

Can the attendees be required to sign a waiver?

If they don't sign, does that deny their right to worship?

[LiberalFighter]

16. Change the building code capacity.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

17. This is an idiotic interpretation of the Constitution by the SCROTUS

Limiting gatherings because of a public threat is not making a law that favors the establishment of a religion. This SCROTUS -- Sick Corrupted Radicals Of The U.S. -- must be reined in before it finishes granting more power to tv preachers than voters and their elected servants.