Amdt1.1.2.1.1.2.5 Exemption of Religious Organizations from Generally Applicable Laws

First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The Civil Rights Act's exemption of religious organizations from the prohibition against religious discrimination in employment¹–2, makes it unlawful for any employer to discriminate in employment practices on the basis of an employee’s religion. Section 702, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e–1, exempts from the prohibition a religious corporation . . . with respect to the employment of individuals of a particular religion to perform work connected with the carrying on by such corporation . . . of its activities. does not violate the Establishment Clause when applied to a religious organization’s secular, nonprofit activities. In Corporation of the Presiding Bishop v. Amos,² the Court held that a church-run gymnasium operated as a nonprofit facility open to the public could require that its employees be church members. Declaring that there is ample room for accommodation of religion under the Establishment Clause,³ the Court identified a legitimate purpose in freeing a religious organization from the burden of predicting which of its activities a court will consider to be secular and which religious. The rule applying across-the-board to nonprofit activities and thereby avoid[ing] . . . intrusive inquiry into religious belief also serves to lessen entanglement of church and state.⁴ The exemption itself does not have a principal effect of advancing religion, the Court concluded, but merely allows churches to advance religion.⁵