Supreme Court Rejects Challenge from South Bay United Pentecostal Church in Chula Vista, California, to Worship Limits

South Bay United Pentecostal Church, a San Diego-area congregation that one report places in Chula Vista, California, and its senior pastor, Bishop Arthur Hodges III, sued over a California executive order limiting attendance at places of worship. According to the reports, Gov. Gavin Newsom first issued guidelines in March that closed houses of worship to the public. The guidelines were later modified to allow attendance limited to 25% of a building’s capacity or 100 people, whichever was lower.

The church and Bishop Hodges sued, alleging that the order violated the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. A federal district court denied the injunction, and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed that decision summarily. The plaintiffs then asked the U.S. Supreme Court for emergency injunctive relief. According to one report, Justice Elena Kagan, to whom the petition was presented, denied it without an opinion.

Reports differ on how the Supreme Court acted. One account says the court voted 5-4 to decline to enjoin the order. A second says the court ruled 5-4 on a Friday night in favor of coronavirus restrictions on religious services in California, and that Chief Justice John Roberts joined the four liberal justices in the majority. A third says the court ruled 5-4 against the church’s challenge to restrictions on religious gatherings and upheld state-imposed limits on attendance at places of worship. The sources agree on the 5-4 division and the outcome for the church, but they do not describe the vote in identical terms.

The church’s central argument, as one report describes it, was that religious services should be treated as essential activities, similar to other businesses. That report presents the argument as the church’s position and does not say how the court’s majority responded to it in its reasoning.

A separate lawsuit is also described in a fourth report. South Bay United Pentecostal Church, Bishop Hodges and Rabbi Mendel Polichenco of Chabad of Carmel Valley filed a suit against Gov. Newsom and other state and local officials. The suit challenges the classification of places of worship as a Stage 3 sector in California’s reopening plan during the COVID-19 pandemic. The report says the plaintiffs argue that this classification places religious services in a less favorable position, but the supplied text of that argument is incomplete, and the report’s date for this filing is not given.

Weighing each account carefully, rather than accepting one version before the others, reflects the principle of truth and fairness (Proverbs 18:17).