Supreme Court sides with religious institutions in a major church-state decision

read:https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-sides-with-religious-institutions-in-a-major-church-state-decision/2017/06/26/f6187a2a-5a13-11e7-9fc6-c7ef4bc58d13_story.html?utm_term=.a80e40c3fab2

WASHINGTON, DC – (Robert Barnes, The Washington Post.  Please click on the link above to read the full story.  Here is an excerpt below.)

The playground at Trinity Lutheran Church, Columbia, MO. (AP photo)

The Supreme Court ended its term Monday with a major First Amendment decision, ruling that efforts at separating church and state go too far when they deny religious institutions access to government grants meant for a secular purpose.

In siding with a Missouri church that had been denied money to resurface its playground, the court ruled 7-2 that excluding churches from state programs for which other charitable groups are eligible is a violation of the Constitution’s protection of the free exercise of religion.

“The consequence is, in all likelihood, a few extra scraped knees,” wrote Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. “But the exclusion of Trinity Lutheran from a public benefit for which it is otherwise qualified, solely because it is a church, is odious to our Constitution all the same, and cannot stand.”