Supreme Court Weighs Rights Of Parochial-School Teachers : NPR: The United States Supreme Court hears arguments Wednesday in a major case testing the rights of teachers in religious schools. At rock bottom, the issue is who is a minister and when, if ever, that individual is exempt from the nation's civil rights laws.
Civil rights statutes do provide some exceptions for religious institutions. The laws allow religious organizations to prefer their own believers in hiring, for instance, and they allow churches and other religious organizations to require their employees to adhere to certain religious tenets. But what happens when a parochial school fires a teacher because she invokes her rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the law that bars discriminating against the disabled? The answer to that question could have huge implications.
