Religious freedom & civil rights groups urge Indiana Supreme Court to protect religious freedom by letting injunction against Indiana abortion ban remain in place

Americans United for Separation of Church and State today was joined by nine religious and civil-rights organizations in urging the Indiana Supreme Court to protect religious freedom by letting stand an injunction against an Indiana abortion ban that imposes legislators’ religious views on all Hoosiers, in violation of the religious-freedom protections in the Indiana Constitution.

‘This abortion ban violates Indiana’s promise of religious freedom’

“This abortion ban violates Indiana’s promise of religious freedom by enshrining legislators’ religious beliefs into law,” said Rachel Laser, President and CEO of Americans United. “If America is to make good on its promise of religious freedom, each of us must be free to make our own decisions about our own bodies based on our own beliefs. Abortion bans are a direct attack on church-state separation. That’s why we need a national recommitment to the separation of church and state. It’s the shield that protects freedom without favor and equality without exception for all of us.”

In an amicus brief filed today in Individual Members of the Medical Licensing Board of Indiana v. Anonymous Plaintiff 1, AU and its allies explain: “Indiana legislators sought to impose their religious beliefs about when life begins on all Hoosiers by enacting S.E.A. 1. The abortion ban thus threatens the state’s healthy religious pluralism, compounds the threat of religiously based strife, and increases the already substantial mistrust of our political institutions by miring them in theological matters that they are not empowered to resolve.”

Religious freedom and civil rights groups join AU’s brief

Joining Americans United on the brief are Bend the Arc: A Jewish Partnership for Justice; Global Justice Institute, Metropolitan Community Churches; Interfaith Alliance Foundation; Men of Reform Judaism; Methodist Federation for Social Action; Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association; The Sikh Coalition; Union for Reform Judaism; and Women of Reform Judaism.