The Supreme Court will hear a Kentucky church’s challenge to a zoning ban that blocked its Virgin Mary shrine, a fight over federal religious liberty law.
The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Thursday to take up a zoning fight that began in Park Hills, Kentucky, after a Catholic church was stopped from building a religious shrine on land next to its property.
At issue is whether a local ordinance that blocked the Missionaries of St. John the Baptist from erecting a large grotto violates the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, the federal law that bars zoning rules from placing a “substantial burden” on religious exercise. The case now joins other religious liberty disputes the justices are set to decide by next summer.
The Hill reported that the church, located in the Cincinnati suburbs, sought a permit for a 39-foot grotto honoring the Virgin Mary on an adjacent lot. Park Hills zoning rules restrict certain land uses to arterial streets. The local zoning board initially let the church move forward anyway.
Neighbors pushed back. They cited traffic concerns and sued, arguing that the conditional use permit violated state and federal law.
A state judge sided with the church. The Kentucky Court of Appeals reversed that win. The Kentucky Supreme Court then affirmed the reversal.
The state’s high court said the ordinance did not substantially infringe on the church’s rights. Its reasoning: the congregation could still build a smaller shrine on its existing plot, and the church knew about the prohibition before it sought the permit.
That is the holding the church is now asking the U.S. Supreme Court to reject. Church lawyers told the justices the lower ruling misunderstands RLUIPA and deepens a long-running split among courts over what counts as a “substantial burden.”
In their petition, lawyers for the church wrote: “The decision below exacerbates the deep fractures on what qualifies as a ‘substantial burden’ among federal and state appellate courts, a well-recognized and longstanding conflict of authority.”
They added: “Given RLUIPA’s critical role in preserving religious liberty, this Court should grant review to clarify its application in the land-use context.”
Lawyers for the neighbors had argued the petition was not the right vehicle for the Court to take up the issue. The justices took the case anyway.
First Liberty is one of the groups representing the church. Kelly Shackelford, its president, CEO, and chief counsel, framed the denial in plain terms.
“Telling a church it can’t build a modest place for prayer and reflection on its own property is outrageous,” Shackelford said.
He also said: “Federal law provides clear protections for how faith-based organizations can use their property to support their mission. This is an important case for religious freedom.”
RLUIPA was written, in part, to stop local governments from using land-use rules to squeeze religious practice. Congress passed it after years of complaints that zoning boards and neighborhood pressure often blocked churches, temples, and other houses of worship while secular projects moved ahead.
Here, the sequence is familiar. A congregation wants a place for prayer. Local rules and neighbor opposition stand in the way. Lower courts then define “substantial burden” so narrowly that a smaller alternative on a tighter lot is treated as good enough. The church’s answer is that federal law does not require believers to shrink their religious plans to fit a city map.
Park Hills is a small city across the river from Cincinnati. The ordinance at the center of the case channels certain uses onto arterial streets. The proposed grotto sat on an adjacent lot, not on those preferred corridors. Neighbors focused on traffic from a 39-foot structure. The church focused on its right to use its land for worship and devotion.
The Kentucky Supreme Court’s core points were practical on their face: build something smaller where you already are, and you knew the rule before you applied. Religious liberty groups see a different problem. If “you could do less elsewhere” becomes the test, almost any denial can be defended. That standard would leave RLUIPA thin where churches need it most, at the zoning counter.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to grant review puts that conflict on the national docket. The justices will decide how far local land-use power can go before it crosses the federal line protecting religious exercise. A ruling is expected by the summer of next year, alongside other religious liberty cases this term.
For congregations watching from outside Kentucky, the stakes are straightforward. Either RLUIPA means a real check on zoning boards that block houses of worship, or “substantial burden” remains a phrase courts can narrow until little remains of the protection Congress wrote into law.
When a church cannot place a shrine for prayer on its own land without years of litigation, the country finds out whether religious liberty is a right on the books or a permission slip from City Hall.
