Religious Groups

WASHINGTON -- Public schools that allow outside groups to use their buildings apparently will also have to let religious organizations in, even for worship services -- at least until the Supreme Court reacts differently than it did yesterday.In a brief order, the court chose to leave intact a lower court decision saying that public schools providing an "open forum" in their facilities have a constitutional duty to give equal access to religious groups.This was the first test case to reach the court on that specific issue.

Plans to begin weekly flights to Cuba from Baltimore have been pushed back to October because of lack of demand, the head of the travel company offering the service said Tuesday. The flights were to begin next month. William Hauf, president of Tampa, Fla.-based Island Travel & Tours Ltd., said his company delayed the start of the service to Havana from Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport to allow more time to market the flights to eligible groups, such as university and religious organizations.

The lawyer for a church-affiliated school in Rockville that fired employees who were not church members asked the state's highest court yesterday to exempt religious groups from a Montgomery County anti-discrimination law, saying the law attacks their freedom of religion. But lawyers for the former workers of the Montrose Christian School said it is their religious freedom that is under attack. The anti-discrimination measure is peculiar to Montgomery County, and most similar laws around the country exempt religious groups, experts said.

Democratic lawmakers say Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. should wait until next year to establish his proposed Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, a stance that could set back one of his policy priorities. Democrats question the need for the agency when the state has been giving various religious groups assistance for decades. Moreover, they said the office's scope needs clarification and that it should be clearly established in an individual bill, not in the state budget submitted to the General Assembly as Ehrlich did this year.

WASHINGTON -- Ruling in a case involving a Maryland parochial school, a federal appeals court has given local governments broad power to exempt religious groups from zoning laws. In a 2-1 decision this week, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals based in Richmond, Va., upheld a Montgomery County ordinance that allows schools run by churches or synagogues to build in residential neighborhoods without obeying land-use restrictions. That decision appeared to be the first by an appeals court to find that governments do not unconstitutionally support religion when they exempt such groups from general building limitations . The appeals court said the exemption in Montgomery County is simply a way to free a religious institution from having to justify to the government its plans for a school building to be used to carry out its religious mission.

The lawyer for a church-affiliated school in Rockville that fired employees who were not church members asked the state's highest court yesterday to exempt religious groups from a Montgomery County anti-discrimination law, saying the law attacks their freedom of religion. Lawyers for the former workers of the Montrose Christian School said it is their religious freedom that is under attack. The anti-discrimination measure is peculiar to Montgomery County, and most similar laws around the country exempt religious groups, experts said.

A point stated here before deserves repeating: For all its affluence, its amenities, its excellent schools, Howard County is not immune to the social ills that afflict less prosperous jurisdictions.Since early in the recession, the county has seen marked increases in various categories of woe: Greater unemployment. More recipients of Aid to Families with Dependent Children. More residents on food stamps and General Public Assistance. Homeless people turned away from shelters. More children eligible for free or reduced-price meals at public schools.

Leaders of churches and synagogues must go beyond their walls and reach out to their communities to help tackle growing ** social problems, Baltimore Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke said at a meeting in Columbia last night.For inner cities to survive, "they must undergo both spiritual and physical rebirth," he said, adding that counties and cities also must work together.The Howard County Clergy for Social Justice, which consists of 50 religious leaders, invited Mr. Schmoke to speak."I think he's a major figure in the state, and we're interested in subjects he's interested in," said Rabbi Martin Siegel, outgoing president of the 6-year-old group.