Diocesan Resources
Discrimination Against Small Church Congregations (2015)
USCCB Fact Sheet: Discrimination Against Small Church Congregations (2015)
Religious Liberty Under Attack: A Concrete Example
In 1994, New York City’s Department of Education denied the request of the Bronx Household of Faith and several other churches to rent space from public schools on weekends for worship services, even though non-religious groups could rent the same schools for scores of other uses. Litigation began soon afterward, and now, twenty years later, about 60-80 small church and synagogue congregations continue to fight for their rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. The church groups have been serving their communities for years and simply wish to be able to rent vacant school space as the City allows other groups to do.
In 2011, a federal appellate court upheld New York City’s ban on private worship services meeting in vacant public schools on weekends. The court stated that a church could conduct a meeting in the NYC public schools that contained singing, praying, preaching, and fellowship, but that they could not conduct a “worship service.” But some denominations’ worship services consist only of singing, praying, preaching, and fellowship.
New York City claims that it only goes on the word of the religious group—that is, if the group says that it is not conducting a worship service, then it can meet. However, the churches claim that the City and school employees have been investigating what the churches do in the public schools and that the City has made its own assessments of whether the meetings constitute a “worship service” or not. Many New York City churchgoers have been protesting the City’s plans to evict them ever since the U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up the case in 2011.