Genoa Twp. Faces Lawsuit: Don’t Catholics Have a Right to Pray on Church Property?
American Freedom Law Center Joins Catholics vs. Genoa Twp. Religious Freedom Battle
The American Freedom Law Center is entering the battle for a Catholic “place of serenity and prayer” in Genoa Twp., Michigan.
“We’ve been retained by Catholic Healthcare International to challenge Genoa Twp’s ridiculous rejection of their special land use application to build a chapel, and a prayer campus on their 40 acres of land that was donated to them by the Diocese,” attorney Robert Muise confirmed.
Muisse, the Ann Arbor-based AFLC co-founder, focuses on cases advancing and defending religious liberty and freedom of speech, said Genoa Twp. Trustees violated the federal Religious Land Use Institutionalized Persons Act.
The Religious Land Use Act, passed unanimously by the U.S. House of Representatives and approved unanimously by the U.S. Senate, was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 2000. The act protects churches and other religious institutions from zoning law restrictions on their property.
The federal act also defines the term “religious exercise” to include “any exercise of religion, whether or not compelled by, or central to, a system of religious…
