Mr. Chief Justice, may it please the court.

I'm John Carlo Conoparo.

I'm Zach Smith.

And welcome to SCOTUS 101, where we break down what's happening at the Supreme Court, what the justices are up to, and other things related to our favorite branch of government.

Welcome back to SCOTUS 101.

It's been another busy week at the court.

We've got orders, denials, dissents, court gossip.

We've got it all this week.

We certainly do.

So let's start off talking about grants.

Last week, the court agreed to hear five cases.

Notable among them was Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, which involves a public high school football coach who lost his job after kneeling and quietly saying a prayer by himself at midfield after a football game ended.

I'm glad the court's agreed to hear that one, G.C. It's a very important case.

There are also two notable denials the

court issued within the past week. The first is in a case called Trustees of the New Life in Christ

Church versus the city of Fredericksburg, Virginia. The church in this case saw a tax exemption

under state law for a home occupied by two individuals it deemed to be ministers.

The city, though, denied the tax exemption, claiming, as Justice Gorsuch put in his

dissent from the denial, that the church, quote, misunderstands who qualifies as a minister

in its own faith tradition, and that a church's religious rules are subject to verification by

government officials. Justice Gorsuch was rightly horrified by this position, as am I, and said,

quote, this case may be a small one, and one can hope that the error here is so obvious it is unlikely

...