Welcome to Breakpoint, a daily look at an ever-changing culture through the lens of unchanging truth.

For the Colson Center, I'm John Stone Street.

Well, recently, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear yet another First Amendment case arising out of Colorado.

St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy involves a law that excludes Catholic and other religious institutions from participating

in the state's so-called universal preschool program, or UPK.

UPK pays for parents to send their children to a Colorado preschool of their choice, either public

or private. The goal is to expand educational choice, allowing parents to choose from a broad range of providers based on their unique needs and values.

Religious schools can participate in UPK, but only if they agree to what Colorado calls a non-discrimination requirement, which tells schools they must provide families an equal opportunity

to enroll, regardless of race, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity,

income level, or disability.

Though this may sound like an everybody-welcome kind of policy, it's not.

In practice, the state grants numerous exceptions, allowing preschools to prefer

children of color or the LGBTQ community or low-income families or children with disabilities

to cite just a few examples. But there's one exception that Colorado clearly will not grant

any religious one. So a Catholic preschool that wants to prefer

Catholic families cannot participate in UPK, and the same is true of evangelical Christian, Orthodox,

Jewish, or other providers who are religiously selective about which families they enroll. And equally

troubling, participating preschools cannot ask families to support the school's

religious views on sex, gender, or marriage. That, Colorado says, is sexual orientation and gender

identity discrimination? Now, Colorado portrays its rule as general and neutral, but in reality,

it specifically fencesences out providers

of traditional religious faith, unless these schools surrender what their faith teaches about

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