Supreme Court will hear case over church school employment

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The constitutionally thorny question of where the line lies between a church school's religious autonomy and the legal rights of its teachers comes before the Supreme Court Oct. 5, two days after the term starts. Other cases on the court's docket this fall include consideration of standards of indecency on network television and at least two cases over what activities warrant deporting immigrants.

Within the court's first weeks, the justices also will decide whether to hear a challenge to Arizona's immigration enforcement law. They also will consider whether to hear several other appeals of how immigration and asylum laws are applied and yet another in a series of challenges to the display of crosses in public places.

The church school case could have broad implications for other religious groups. Cheryl Perich was an elementary school teacher at Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church in Redford, Mich., in 2004 when she became ill with narcolepsy. When she prepared to return from disability leave more than six months later, the school asked her to resign, citing concerns about her readiness to work and the contract it had with her replacement teacher.

Perich threatened to sue under the Americans with Disabilities Act and the school fired her. She then filed a case with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, charging that she was fired for threatening to sue. The school has maintained that because Perich had the status of "called" teacher, a designation the Evangelical Lutheran Church gives those involved in religious instruction, the ADA is not applicable in her case and the EEOC has no jurisdiction. Perich taught a standard fourth-grade curriculum but also taught some religion classes and was occasionally responsible for chapel services.