The Supreme Court declined on Tuesday to hear a case about the way one of the Catholic Church‘s annual collections is presented to its congregation, allowing the case to proceed in a lower court despite concerns about the government infringing on religious autonomy.The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops had urged the Supreme Court to take up the case, where it was seeking to toss a lawsuit challenging the way the church’s “Peter’s Pence” offering is described to parishioners, claiming ruling against the church’s collection would infringe on its religious autonomy under the First Amendment.“Such disputes are beyond the ken of civil courts. The Religion Clauses of the First Amendment ensure churches can decide for themselves, free from state interference, matters of church governance. That’s what the Church’s description and religious use of a millennium-old offering to the Pope is: a matter of church governance,” the USCCB argued in its petition to the Supreme Court.
“Thus, the state interference required to adjudicate this lawsuit — which involves demands for lists of papal donors, accounting for the Pope’s use of Peter’s Pence, and disclosure of the Bishops’ internal communications with the Holy See about Peter’s Pence — would violate the church autonomy doctrine,” the petition continued.
