CU Anschutz facing legal challenge to religious vaccine exemption policy
Plus the ongoing saga of Tina Peters, disputes in Cherry Creek and Douglas County schools and much more
Clashes over whether and to what extent schools should have the right to impose public health measures limiting the spread of COVID-19 are continuing apace in Colorado. The University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus is facing a lawsuit from an unnamed pediatrician and medical student, who both claim that their requests for religious exemptions from the school’s vaccine mandate were unfairly denied.
According to reporting from the Associated Press, the two plaintiffs are a Catholic woman who requested an exemption “based on her Catholic beliefs and opposition to ‘abortion-derived cell lines’ used in the three available vaccines in the U.S.” and a Buddhist man from British Columbia who “requested a religious exemption citing his Buddhist beliefs and his avoidance of ‘products developed through the killing or harming of animals (including human beings),’ ” AP reports.
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court by the Thomas More Society, a conservative-leaning nonprofit legal firm in Chicago that has challenged the legality of abortion, gay marriage, vaccine mandates, and the results of the 2020 presidential election in court.
The lawsuit is part of a growing debate around what constitutes a legitimate religious-based opposition to vaccination and what is simply a strongly-held personal belief.
“This idea that you have to have to have a centralized authority to get a religious exemption, it strikes against everything we know about the First Amendment and our whole system of the relationship between the church and the state,” Thomas More vice president Peter Breen told the AP.
The Cherry Creek School District is also facing a lawsuit from school board candidate Schumé Navarro alleging that the district is violating her rights by requiring her to wear a mask at candidate forums. The lawsuit is not based on religious grounds — Navarro says she has a disability and psychological issue that prevent her from wearing a mask — but in social media posts and YouTube videos Navarro frequently invokes her Christian faith.
In a video on her YouTube channel discussing her time in D.C. during the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, she says that she believes “it is unbiblical, and I would go so far as to say it’s a sin honestly to partner with mainstream news at this point.” In a Facebook post suggesting that the results of the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent, she included the hashtags #GodWins, #warmupthegallows and #treasonseason.
In neighboring Douglas County, a Jewish family has filed a complaint with the Office of Civil Rights against charter school American Academy after a board member made a Facebook post comparing pandemic health measures to antisemitism during the Holocaust, according to Kyle Clark of 9News. Clark posted a letter from the school defending the board member, who it claims was speaking out against “the kind of government that perpetrated anti-Semitism and the Holocaust.”
Religion and Voter Fraud Pt. 3 (it just keeps coming up)
After spending more than a month in South Dakota — drawn by an invitation from Mike Lindell invitation to a “symposium” — Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters “made a triumphant return” to Grand Junction, The Washington Post reported in a recent story. One of her first stops was Appleton Christian Church, where 250 supporters welcomed Mesa County’s top election official who has been at the center of a controversy around voter fraud claims.
The Washington Post’s recent story follows a lot of great reporting by local outlets about Peters allegedly allowing a non-county employee access to the county’s voting machines to copy hard drives. Colorado Secretary of State Jenna Griswold is suing Peters over the allegations. Amidst all that, Peters traveled to the event that was about voter fraud claims in South Dakota.
Naturally, religion has a presence. A previous edition of this newsletter highlighted a Grand Junction Sentinel story about emails that people were sending to Peters when she was in South Dakota showing their support for her after she came under fire. Many of those letters were religious in nature.
Well, the Washington Post story showed those letters were followed by the homecoming event at Appleton. The Post writes:
After 38 days away, Peters arrived at a Grand Junction church in a black Suburban with dark tinted windows. She slipped in the church’s side door and stood before a large wooden cross as about 250 maskless rallygoers jumped to their feet, clapped, waved and cheered wildly. ‘This is all for you,” she said, breaking into tears. “You’re the ones who came to me and said ‘something’s not right.’ ”
Meanwhile, the Grand Junction Sentinel did more reporting on Peters and the religiosity of the controversy in an article about the copy of those hard drives circulating on QAnon blogs. Charles Asbhy at the Sentinel writes, “Several people nationwide who subscribe to that wide-ranging and oft-disputed conspiracy theory are now circulating Peters’ report on the county’s hard drive on Q-Anon blogs and far right social media platforms, repeating Peters’ contention that they prove Dominion election machines were behind an alleged fraud that cost former President Donald Trump his re-election bid last fall.”
Briefly noted
Participants at the Denver American Indian Festival spoke to the Denver Post about working to keep native culture, traditions and spirituality alive.
Denver-based writer Meg Conley was interviewed about the Amazon documentary LuLaRich, where she spoke about MLM scheme LuLaRoe’s Mormon roots.
An image of Our Lady of Guadalupe will be traveling around Colorado in October and Archbishop Aquila will host a special mass in her honor on Oct. 7 at Denver’s Cathedral Basilica, which will be livestreamed.
CSU’s student newspaper The Collegian wrote about observing the High Holidays in Fort Collins.
The Gazette wrote about the legacy of minister and civil rights activist Jesse Brown Jr., whose death now leaves ‘a void’ in the community.
A vacant church in Denver’s Hilltop neighborhood sold to a developer for $3.75 million and will be turned into a gated community.
CAIR Colorado put out a release condemning the distribution of racist flyers around businesses in downtown Longmont last Friday.
The Colorado Sun ran an op-ed from a queer woman about her experience teaching at a now-defunct private Christian school in Arvada.
Mosaic Church Pastor Reid Hettich was one of the “nine lives” the Aurora Sentinel profiled for its cover story about ordinary Aurora citizens doing remarkable things.
More items have been recovered and an arrest has been made in connection with the burglary of an African-American Catholic parish in Denver last month.
United Church of Christ in Longmont turned 66 firearms that it netted from a gun buyback program into garden tools.
A new prayer garden is taking shape in the Colorado Springs suburb of Fountain, the first of its kind in Colorado.
“Have Faith, Colorado” is a weekly roundup and analysis of local religion articles in the Centennial State. It’s by Liam Adams and Carina Julig. Carina covers education and other Aurora news at the Sentinel Colorado. Liam has worked as a local journalist in Colorado and a freelancer covering religion. He recently started as the religion reporter at The Tennessean. To connect with us about the newsletter please email liamadams.journalism@gmail.com and carina.julig@colorado.edu, and follow us on twitter at @liamsadams and @CarinaJulig.