A Catholic preschool in Colorado took a major step forward in their case to reverse the religious discrimination that students experienced when they applied for state funding. The lawsuit is so significant that several members of Congress filed an amicus brief in St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy, which the United States Supreme Court will hear during its term in October. 

The brief was filed by numerous Republicans in the House and Senate and spearheaded by Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) and Senator James Lankford (R-Okla.).

According to a press release by the House Education and Workforce Committee, the members are urging the court “ to protect the constitutional rights of faith-based schools participating in school choice programs and warns that allowing the 10th Circuit’s decision to stand could undermine Congress’s tax credit scholarship program established under the Working Families Tax Cuts.” In 2023, Colorado’s Department of Early Childhood created a funding program for preschool students, offering eligible families $6,300 for 15 hours per week for their child to attend preschool. Classified as “universal,” the funding was promoted to the public as available to students of public and private schools. 

However, this benefit was not given to families who chose to send their children to the St. Mary Catholic Parish preschool in Littleton, Colorado. The department claimed that the preschool’s Christian values were not consistent with the requirements of the funding program. 

“But at the same time, the Department has allowed countless secular preschools to impose requirements that similarly limit who is able to enroll,” said the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a legal and educational institute that is serving as counsel to St. Mary’s. “For example, the state allows secular preschools to serve only low income families, families receiving housing vouchers, and kids with disabilities. Worse, state officials admitted to a clear double standard: Colorado families would be allowed to use government funding to send their children to preschools that prioritized admitting LGBTQ families, transgender children, or even children of a specific race.”

“Deuteronomy 6 teaches that parents have the primary discipleship responsibility for their children,” David Closson, director for the Center for Biblical Worldview at Family Research Council told The Washington Stand. “Colorado’s so-called universal preschool program ceases to be universal when religious families are effectively excluded.”

The case was filed in 2023, and in 2025, the Becket Fund asked the Supreme Court to hear the case. In April of this year, it agreed. 

“If the 10th Circuit’s decision is allowed to stand, states could adopt similar policies that effectively exclude faith-based schools from participating in the federal tax credit scholarship program enacted by Congress in 2025, undermining the religious freedom protected by the First Amendment,” the committee underscored in a press release. 

Lawmakers like Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.) point out that the precedent set by Colorado’s policy could become a slippery slope toward increasingly severe religious discrimination. “If this is allowed to move forward, they could find things that the church would disagree with in their schools and just tailor it so that no religious schools could be able to get any funding,” Aderholt explained during “Washington Watch” Wednesday. “This Colorado program gives families the ability to send their children to public or private schools of their choice. But there’s one catch to that. It is limited to those that [are not] affiliated with [a] religion. It doesn’t say that on its face, but if you look in the details of the bill, really, that’s what it’s saying.”

For Dan and Lisa Sheley, a Catholic couple in Colorado raising seven children, sending their children to a school that reflects their faith values is of the utmost importance. They want their youngest, who will start preschool at St. Mary’s in 2028, to be in an educational environment centered around Catholicism, the Becket Fund detailed. 

“Colorado is one of those states that does not have a real love for religious freedom, especially when it comes to the Christian faith,” Aderholt noted. 

In the past, Colorado has been known to lose cases arguing against religious freedom, such as the Masterpiece Cake Shop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission decision in 2018, in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of a Christian baker who declined to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding. 

“The state cannot discriminate against family simply because they seek a school that integrates faith into every aspect of its curriculum,” Closson emphasized. “It’s important to remember that religious liberty is not a second-class right and that parents should never be forced to choose between faithfully raising their children, according to their convictions and receiving a public benefit, made available to everyone else.”