A federal appeals court recently sided with World Vision in a lawsuit challenging the ministry’s insistence that its employees to be aligned with it on a matter of faith—the biblical covenant of marriage. ECFA welcomed the ruling based on the constitutional “ministerial exception,” but also noted the court’s choice to withhold judgment on other important arguments undergirding the role of religious freedom in employment decisions.  

This case began in 2021 when World Vision offered a woman a customer service representative post but then rescinded the offer when she disclosed that she was married to a woman. While a federal district court originally supported World Vision, it reversed course and rejected the ministry’s defenses under state and federal law, including the ministerial exception. World Vision then appealed to the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. 

Writing for the appeals panel, Judge Richard Tallman explained that the lower court erred in determining that World Vision’s customer service representatives could not be covered by the ministerial exception. Tallman found that the case’s record actually revealed they carry out “key religious functions central to World Vision’s mission,” particularly as they “engage with donors in prayer and give them the opportunity to join World Vision’s religious mission through financial contributions.” He zeroed in on the understanding that World Vision’s customer service representatives are the ministry’s “voice, face, and heart,” and without them “World Vision would be severely hindered in pursuing its central religious mission.” 

Tallman rejected arguments that positions largely secular in duties are necessarily excluded from the possibility of being ministerial. However, he did note that the court does not believe general religious requirements for employees (like praying or participating in services) automatically make those employees ministerial. He specifically suggested that secretaries, accountants, and custodians would not qualify for the ministerial exception.  

“A religious organization must show more: that the position it claims is ministerial performs ‘vital religious duties’ at the core of the organization’s mission,” he wrote. 

In this case, the appeals court ruled that World Vision had successfully done just that, so it was victorious on the basis of the ministerial exception. Believing that judgement to be sufficient in this case, Tallman and his colleagues chose not to address other constitutional and statutory arguments, including one based on a straightforward reading of civil rights law.  

ECFA and more than twenty other church and ministry organizations had pointed out in a legal brief that the plain text of Title VII and relevant case law shows that when ministries make employment decisions based on religious beliefs, observance, or practice, that fact overrules other provisions in that section of the law, including its sex discrimination prohibition. The brief also noted that the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2020 Bostock ruling, which incorporated sexual orientation and gender identity into the term “sex” under Title VII, did nothing to diminish this understanding of that religious exemption. In fact, the high court underscored the significance of Congress creating “an express statutory exception for religious organizations” in its majority opinion. 

“The district court’s conclusion that section 702 cannot apply to ‘claims . . . premised on sex and sexual orientation discrimination’… would preclude the exemption from applying to any sex discrimination claim arising under Bostock, notwithstanding the Supreme Court’s assurance to the contrary,” stated ECFA’s World Vision filing. 

While this case and another recent religious employment ruling by the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals relied on the ministerial exception, other defenses may soon demand attention. Notably, a case contending for Yakima Union Gospel Mission's right to employ only mission-aligned Christian believers was argued by Alliance Defending Freedom before the Ninth Circuit in June. Moreover, U.S, Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas suggested in 2022 that “the day may soon come when we must decide whether the autonomy guaranteed by the First Amendment protects religious organizations’ freedom to hire co-religionists without state or judicial interference.” 

“To force religious organizations to hire messengers and other personnel who do not share their religious views would undermine not only the autonomy of many religious organizations but also their continued viability,” they declared. 

ECFA will continue to monitor such court battles and be a voice for religious liberty.