Catholics’ First Amendment Rights Come Before the Supreme Court

R eligious liberty has come before the U.S. Supreme Court once again. On November 3, the justices will hear St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy, in which Colorado authorities are blatantly infringing on Catholic families’ First Amendment rights. Yet this case isn’t just another chance to reaffirm the government’s obligation not to discriminate against people of faith. It should also cause religious believers to recognize that taxpayer funding could threaten their own fidelity to faith.

The facts in this case are clear and concerning. In 2023, Colorado launched a universal preschool program, providing families with about $6,300 in funding per eligible child. But when a Catholic family tried to send their children to their parish preschool, the state refused to hand over the money. Officials balked at the school’s requirement that families uphold Catholic teaching, including the sanctity of marriage and the reality of biological sex.

Rarely will you see a more blatant attack on religious liberty. Colorado is perfectly willing to fund preschools that enforce and evangelize the most aggressive LGBT ethic imaginable. By denying funding specifically for Catholic schools, the state is saying that religious views are inferior — that Catholics are, in effect, second-class citizens the moment they try to live out their faith and should not receive the same state funding as parents who choose to send their children to non-parochial schools. Such unequal treatment is fundamentally unjust and inconsistent with the First Amendment.

Given its recent rulings on religious liberty, the Supreme Court will probably side against Colorado and rule in favor of Catholic families and schools. Such a decision would be welcome and hopefully would give pause to other hard-left states that clearly want to marginalize and manipulate religious belief. California and New York, I’m looking at you.

Yet the case should also cause people of faith to reflect on whether they’re putting themselves at risk of compromising their own deeply held beliefs by participating in these programs. Politicians and bureaucrats don’t just target religion because they dislike it. Government power is inherently coercive, and when public officials exclude or penalize Catholic schools, they are pressuring educators and families to think twice about their faith whenever taxpayer money is on the line.

If you’re a principal, it’s hard to turn down that $6,300 per child. If you’re a parent, it’s hard to think that little Johnny won’t get the education you want for him. The temptation may be small, but it’s there, and it’s constant. Why not water down Church teaching to make everything easier? Why not take the path of least resistance — and the most money?

Clearly, the Catholic families and Church authorities in Colorado haven’t given in to this temptation, and full credit to them. The temptation may also diminish if the Supreme Court rules the right way and protects religious liberty. But this isn’t the first — and it won’t be the last — time the government uses its awesome power to quietly compel a change in belief.

Colorado’s preschool program is far from the only taxpayer-funded program that benefits Catholics or adherents of other religions. A rapidly growing number of states now have universal education savings accounts, which give families taxpayer money to spend on different schools, including religious ones. It isn’t hard to envision state officials attaching strings to all that money. It’s easy to see them using families’ reliance on taxpayer cash to shape how those families think and act. If that seems far-fetched, you haven’t been paying attention to recent history. Politicians have power. They like to use — and abuse — it.

Worrying signs are already evident in areas like government funding for religious charities. Catholic Charities received $1.4 billion in government support in 2022, compared to $1 billion in private donations. The deluge of taxpayer cash appears to have made Catholic leaders less willing to support policies like welfare work requirements, even though such policies reflect human dignity — a core Church teaching. Vice President JD Vance has drawn attention to this reality, questioning if bishops care more about boosting the bottom line than defending the faith. I doubt any Catholic bishop or leader explicitly thinks that, but taxpayer money is mentally and morally corrupting in ways that people often fail to see.

That’s not to say that some government programs, like universal preschool programs or education savings accounts, aren’t good. The latter in particular enables thousands of religious families to give their children a religious education, which is profoundly beneficial. Yet people of faith must be vigilant to protect their beliefs from government meddling. So long as there’s taxpayer money on the table, there will be politicians and bureaucrats who want to use it to erode religious principles and practice.

The First Amendment is a strong bulwark against such attacks, but no bulwark is stronger than people of faith jealously guarding their most cherished beliefs. Given its recent rulings in First Amendment cases, the Supreme Court seems likely to strike down Colorado’s latest attack on religious liberty, but the faithful must also demonstrate religious wisdom. Anti-religious government officials will keep devising programs with strings attached and carrots dangled. Discrimination against the religious is a great injustice, but dependence on taxpayer money is a grave danger, too.