In a Statement of Interest filed on Sunday, the DOJ explained that governments are in a position to take necessary and temporary measures to meet genuine emergencies. However, "there is no pandemic exception to the Constitution and its Bill of Rights."

On Palm Sunday, the Sunday before Easter, Lighthouse Fellowship had conducted a worship service with a congregation of 16 people practicing so-called social distancing in a facility that seats more than 200.

As reported by Liberty Counsel, which represents Lighthouse Fellowship in court, "a local police officer entered the church. He gave no introduction and did not ask for the pastor. He abruptly said they could not have more than 10 people spaced six feet apart."

After the service, "two police officers entered the church in full mask and gloves and asked to speak with the pastor. They issued Pastor Wilson a summons and informed him that if he had service on Easter, and if more than ten people attended, everyone would receive the same summons."

The DOJ compared the restrictions imposed on religious gatherings by Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, a Democrat, to those on many businesses.

"Because the executive orders prohibit Lighthouse's sixteen-person, socially distanced gathering in a 225-seat church but allow similar secular conduct, such as a gathering of 16 lawyers in a large law firm conference room, the governor's executive orders may constitute a violation of the church's constitutional rights to the free exercise of religion," the DOJ stated.

"The ultimate question for this Court, then, is whether the Commonwealth's prohibition on in-person religious worship exceeding ten people to Lighthouse's sixteen-person gathering—while exempting all non-retail businesses and others from the ten-person limit—furthers a compelling interest, and whether there is no less restrictive measure the Commonwealth could use to achieve that interest while allowing the church to hold its services," the federal government's Statement of Interest summarized... Subscribe for free to Breaking Christian News here

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