The Wild Hunt (https://wildhunt.org/tag/law)
The Supreme Court sided with a Christian counselor challenging Colorado’s conversion therapy ban, ruling it raises First Amendment concerns and must be reconsidered, highlighting tensions between free speech protections and regulation of licensed mental health practices.
As many Pagans understand, nature can recover when given the chance. Across the globe, rewilding projects are restoring rivers, forests, wetlands, and wildlife, while efforts in California, Florida, Canada, Italy, and Scotland demonstrate success. Illinois has taken a further step, becoming the first U.S. state to enshrine rewilding into law.
A Ninth Circuit ruling on faith-based hiring clarifies how the First Amendment’s church autonomy doctrine limits state interference, with implications extending beyond Christianity to Pagan and other minority religious organizations.
A federal judge has permanently dismissed The Satanic Temple’s challenge to Idaho’s abortion bans, finding the group lacked standing and that no amendment could save its claims, ending years of litigation over religious freedom and reproductive rights.
Our correspondent, Sean Little, who has been following the story for years, offers analysis and a final round-up of the Oak Flat case, examining the critical legal battles over sacred land, the evolving interpretation of “substantial burden,” and what this precedent means for Indigenous and minority religions in the United States.