Massachusetts high court bars religious school teacher from bringing workplace discrimination claim

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

The First Amendment protects religious organizations from facing age discrimination lawsuits brought by teachers at religious schools, the state’s highest court ruled today.

The Supreme Judicial Court dismissed a workplace discrimination claim brought in 2008 by Gaye Hilsenrath against Temple Emanuel in Newton after she lost her part-time job at the temple-run Rabbi Albert I. Gordon Religious School.

The court ruled that the temple’s teacher hiring decisions were protected under “ministerial exceptions’’ to anti-discrimination laws because of the First Amendment’s ban on state intrusion into religious decisions.

Hilsenrath “taught religious subjects at a school that functioned solely as a religious school, whose mission was to teach Jewish children about Jewish learning, language, history, traditions, and prayer,’’ Justice Ralph Gants wrote for the unanimous court.

http://www.boston.com/metrodesk/2012/09/19/massachusetts-high-court-bars-religious-school-teacher-from-bringing-workplace-discrimination-claim/tzunwZnC0qFbHxO8vvzzFP/story.html

Here's the opinion:

http://www.universalhub.com/2012/temple-emanuel-newton-vs-massachusetts-commission