Supreme Court strikes another pandemic-related restriction on religious services

In another late-night ruling, the Supreme Court on Friday blocked another California coronavirus restriction on religious gatherings, saying the state’s limits on home-based Bible study and prayer sessions violated constitutional rights.

The 5-to-4 order on an emergency petition illustrates how a new majority on the court — with Justice Amy Coney Barrett playing a decisive role — is now in control when the court considers if pandemic-related restrictions cross the line to endanger religious rights.

Constitutional protections are implicated any time a state treats “any comparable secular activity more favorably than religious exercise,” the majority wrote. “It is no answer that a state treats some comparable secular businesses or other activities as poorly as or even less favorably than the religious exercise at issue.”