Supreme Court case for first Catholic charter school begins oral arguments

A Catholic charter school is appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court to approve the nation’s first publicly funded religious charter school in a case that could reshape school choice and religious freedom in the U.S.

In an opening brief filed on Wednesday, St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School — a Catholic charter school managed by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa and Eastern Oklahoma — maintained that it is religious discrimination for the state to withhold generally available funding solely because the school is religious.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court previously ordered Oklahoma’s charter school board to rescind the contract with St. Isidore in June, citing the First Amendment’s prohibition of laws that would establish a state religion.

Shortly after, both St. Isidore and the Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board filed separate petitions to the U.S. Supreme Court in October 2024.

In the opening briefs, St. Isidore and the school board maintained that if the state is going to offer general funding for private charter organizations, it cannot deny that funding to a charter school on the basis of religion. 

“The First Amendment protects St. Isidore from discriminatory state laws that would bar it from participating in that program or receiving funding solely because the school it has designed is religious,” read the brief filed by the Notre Dame Law School’s Lindsay and Matt Moroun Religious Liberty Clinic, a teaching law practice that trains Notre Dame law students.

The attorneys pointed out that Oklahoma designed the program “to foster educational diversity through privately designed and operated charter schools … but Oklahoma denies that opportunity to religious entities solely because they are religious.” 

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