• A church in Washington is challenging a state law that requires it to provide abortion coverage in employee health care plans.
• That challenge is now being considered by a large panel of appeals court judges in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
• Sutherland Institute has filed an amicus brief in the case explaining that the challenged law interferes with the church’s religious autonomy by forcing the church to facilitate abortions even though doing so is at odds with the church’s teachings.

​Can the government require you to do something that violates your most cherished beliefs? The idea seems unthinkable, but a case being considered by a federal appeals court raises this precise question.

The case involves a church in Washington that is challenging a 2018 state law requiring businesses “to provide coverage for abortion” if they “also offers maternity care coverage to its employees.”  A Washington church, Cedar Park Assembly of God, has a religious objection to paying for abortions but the company that provides its employee benefits added abortion coverage to the church’s employee benefits to comply with the law. So, the church sought a court order to exempt it from the requirement on religious freedom grounds.

A federal district court initially dismissed the case on procedural grounds only to be reversed on appeal. This sent the case back to the district court which ruled in favor of the state, leading to a second appeal. This time another panel of appeals court judges ruled that since the church could get another plan that provides abortion coverage indirectly even though the church objects to any role in facilitating support for abortion whether by paying for an insurance plan that directly covers abortion or buying a plan that ensures indirect coverage. Either way, the church’s decision to provide insurance results in abortion coverage.

Thus, the church is now asking for a larger group of appeals court judges, called an en banc panel, to review that decision.

Among other important issues raised by the case is the principle of religious autonomy. The U.S. Supreme Court has said this guarantees religious organizations the “power to decide for themselves, free from state interference, maters of church government as well as those of faith and doctrine.”

Sutherland Institute filed an amicus brief in support of en banc review to point out that requiring a church to use its employee benefit plans to support conduct at odds with the church’s teachings undercuts its religious autonomy. It does this by requiring the church to support with its finances and institutional structure the practice of abortion.

Ironically, this policy appears to conflict with federal law which prohibits recipients of federal funds from discriminating against a health care entity for not providing, paying for or referring for abortions. These protections allow churches to ensure that their actions model and express their beliefs. If Washington’s requirement is upheld that protection is endangered or lost.

The conflict with federal law makes clear that Washington has no overriding purpose that would justify it in undercutting the religious freedom of religious organizations that conscientiously object to facilitating abortion.

Where there is no compelling reason, states should not try to force people of faith and religious organizations to act in ways at odds with their religious convictions. That is something the constitutional protections of religious freedom were created to prevent. The judges on the 9^th Circuit assigned to this case should apply those protections to Cedar Park Assembly of God’s desire to be free of penalties for living its faith.