Posted on 12/29/2020 5:50:25 PM PST by marshmallow
In Resurrection School v. Gordon, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 242315 (WD MI, Dec. 16, 2020), a Michigan federal district court refused to issue a preliminary injunction sought by parents of Catholic school children to eliminate the COVID face covering requirement for children attending K through Grade 5 at religious schools. Parents contend that the requirement interferes with the free exercise of the students' religion. Rejecting that claim, the court said in part:
The order is clear: individuals over the age of five must wear a mask when they are out in public. Therefore, given the near-universal mask requirement, the Court finds nothing in the contours of the order at issue that correlate to religion, and finds that the order "cannot be plausibly read to contain even a hint of hostility towards religion." ...
(Excerpt) Read more at religionclause.blogspot.com ...
"Therefore, given the near-universal mask requirement, "
“Unfortunately, a mask shields
our humanity. And because God created us in His image, we are masking that image. Masks also
make us anti-social. They interfere with relations. As the Catholic faith teaches, we are relational
beings. And our existence as relational beings points to the Holy Trinity. A mask is disruptive to
this essential element of the Catholic faith, and it is disruptive to the teaching of young children for
these and other reasons. Plaintiffs share these deeply held religious beliefs.”
Plaintiffs are making s*** up, says this Catholic.
Make them prove there is a virus Make them prove masks actually work
If you are Catholic, then you should recognize that the statements of faith are correct. And indeed, the consequences of masking include shielding our humanity (our faces and personal expressions are part of what makes us unique individuals), decreased interaction (obvious, and the the other controls make it worse), and inhibit the interactions that we do have (more difficult to hear, read lips, and pick up on facial expressions). Last spring, I wrote something similar to our priest and bishop.
Masks are inhumane and should be a matter of choice for individuals, businesses, and churches.
I’ve never seen any encyclical, Catechism text, or argument by a theologian supporting those “statements of faith”. And I’m very confident that if pre-COVID a student had come in wearing a mask (absent personal medical need) if the school didn’t just shrug it off, their stated reasons why he couldn’t would have had nothing to do with those “statements of faith”.
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