U.S. Supreme Court shoots down agenda forcing nuns to pay for abortions

The Supreme Court has shot down a lower court’s “bully tactics” that allowed state officials in New York to force religious objectors to pay for abortion.

The decision comes in Diocese of Albany v. Harris, and cited the high court’s own earlier decision in Catholic Charities Bureau v. Wisconsin Labor & Industry Review Commission.

The issue is leftists in various states keep trying to force religious organizations and others to pay for abortion, which violates the religious rights of people in those groups.

The court’s announcement Monday about its decision was brief: “The judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the court of appeals for New York for further consideration in light of Catholic Charities Bureau Inc. v. Wisconsin Labor & Industry.”

Becket, the organization that was fighting the case on behalf of the religious group members, explained further: “The Supreme Court has ordered New York courts to reconsider Diocese of Albany v. Harris, a case challenging New York’s abortion mandate, in light of Becket’s unanimous victory in Catholic Charities Bureau v. Wisconsin Labor & Industry Review Commission. In 2017, a group of Catholic and Anglican nuns, Catholic dioceses, Christian churches, and faith-based social ministries challenged New York’s mandate forcing them to pay for employees’ abortions. After New York courts declined to protect the faith groups, Becket and Jones Day asked the Supreme Court to step in.”

It’s not the first trip to the high court for the case, Becket noted, “In 2021, the justices reversed the lower courts’ rulings and told them to reconsider the case, but the courts ignored that instruction. Now the Supreme Court has ordered the New York courts to go back to the drawing board.”

It was the New York State Department of Financial Services that had demanded an abortion mandate for health care plans. At that time, it promised to exempt all employers with religious objections.

“But after facing pressure from abortion activists, New York narrowed the exemption to cover only religious groups that primarily teach religion and primarily serve and hire those who share their faith. This exception does not apply to many religious ministries—including the ministries challenging the mandate here—because they serve all people, regardless of faith,” Becket explained.

“For example, the exemption doesn’t extend to the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm and their Teresian Nursing Home because they serve the elderly and dying regardless of religious affiliation.”

Becket spokesman Eric Baxter noted, “New York wants to browbeat nuns into paying for abortions for the great crime of serving all those in need. For the second time in four years, the Supreme Court has made clear that bully tactics like these have no place in our nation or our law. We are confident that these religious groups will finally be able to care for the most vulnerable consistent with their beliefs.”

“Religious groups in the Empire State should not be forced to provide insurance coverage that violates their deeply held religious beliefs,” explained Noel J. Francisco, of Jones Day, which also worked on the case.