'Horrible opinion' against churches isn't final

A religious freedom law firm remains hopeful that the Supreme Court will hear a case involving state limits on attendance at worship services.

Recently on "The Todd Starnes Show," Kelly Shackelford of First Liberty Institute and Starnes were discussing the Supreme Court's rejection of a California church's emergency appeal challenging state limits on attendance at worship services due to government concerns about COVID-19.

Chief Justice John Roberts was the deciding vote against the emergency appeal, but Shackelford is optimistic for a Supreme Court case.

"The bad thing was not just he didn't vote in favor of the church, but he said some things that were highly disturbing that, again, this is in a very unique kind of appeal," said Kelly Schackelford. "He said things like, 'We're an unelected judiciary; we cannot second guess the policy makers’' and said a number of things that, in the context of fundamental First Amendment rights, that is their job to question the policy makers."

While the decision is not final, Shackelford fears it could be misinterpreted as well as misused to attack churches, "not only in this situation, but in the future if we can't get this thing turned around."

Shackelford went on to point out that Chief Justice Roberts has "actually been very good on religious freedom."

"I think what threw him off is the fact of how it arrived and the timing of everything," he continued. "Our goal at First Liberty is to get a case up to the Supreme Court before all this is over to hopefully begin to wipe out and clean up this horrible opinion that came down Friday night as far as what Justice Kavanaugh had to say."