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Church, City of Detroit fight atheist suit over funds

A church that was denied reimbursement through a Detroit city program for its building renovations because of a legal challenge by atheists, has appeared before a judge asking for summary judgment in the case filed by the atheists against the city.



St. John's Episcopal Church, the church denied the reimbursement, was allowed entrance by the court as an intervenor in the case in December, becoming a defendant. Church legal counsel Dale Schowengerdt of Alliance Defense Fund says St. John's made $180,000 in renovations to its exterior after contracting for 50 percent reimbursement through a Detroit Development Authority program designed to help enhance the appearance of city buildings and lots ahead of the 2006 Super Bowl. Nine of the 91 properties which were eligible participants were churches or church-owned properties.

Schowengerdt explains that "because of that, a group called American Atheists sued to have this plan declared unconstitutional." After American Atheists v. City of Detroit was filed, the city withheld reimbursement funds to St. John's and other church participants.

Schowengerdt and the church are out to prove the discrimination against religious organizations contradicts the Establishment Clause found in the First Amendment to the Constitution.

"The counterpart to that is the free exercise clause," he explains, "and the [U.S.] Supreme Court has held numerous times that if you exclude religious organizations, [if] you exclude churches from a neutral program, that [is] evidence [of] hostility to religion, not neutrality."

The ADF attorney says the atheist group's argument is based on a "cramped interpretation" of the First Amendment. He states that reimbursement promised to a church for non-religious purposes is no more an establishment of religion than the reimbursement promised to non-religious groups.