‘Something has gone seriously awry’: Supreme Court strikes down California’s Covid ban on church worsip

The court rejected similar restrictions in New York

California churches will be able to re-open with limited capacity after the Supreme Court struck down some of the state’s strict coronavirus policies.

The decision signals the priorities of the court’s new conservative super-majority to protect religious rights, even at the potential expense of public health.

“If Hollywood may host a studio audience or film a singing competition while not a single soul may enter California’s churches, synagogues, and mosques, something has gone seriously awry,” wrote justice Neil Gorsuch, a Trump appointee.

He joined the five other conservatives on the court. They argued the state was singling out religious institutions for stricter rules while other types of establishments have remained open under limited capacity.

“This Court certainly is not downplaying the suffering many have experienced in this pandemic,“ Mr Gorsuch added.

Prior to the ruling, California governor Gavin Newsom introduced a tiered series of coronavirus restrictions across the state, prohibiting indoor church services in regions with widespread Covid cases.

The court ruled religious institutions could re-open for indoor worship with 25 per cent capacity, though didn’t explain how it reached this resolution to the case, which arrived before the tribunal on a fast-tracked emergency appeal with limited briefing. 

Justice Elena Kagan, writing in dissent on behalf of the Court’s remaining liberal wing, blasting the ruling as hypocritical, given the Supreme Court itself is conducting business remotely, and warned that the jurists shouldn’t second-guess health experts with “armchair epidemiology.”

“Justices of this Court are not scientists,” she wrote. “If this decision causes suffering, we will not pay. Our marble halls are now closed to the public, and our life tenure forever insulates us from responsibility for our errors. That would seem good reason to avoid disrupting a state’s pandemic response.”

Prior to the death of the progressive justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the court had sided with public health experts and allowed religious restrictions to go forward in some cases. 

Her replacement with the Trump-appointed Amy Coney Barett swung the court further rightward, and Friday’s ruling follows other court decisions to strike down similar restrictions in New York. 

South Bay United Pentecostal Church in Chula Vista,  Harvest Rock Church in Pasadena, and the statewide Harvest International Ministry were the California churches who challenged the rules.