Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/19-267_1an2.pdf
Page Number: 30

26 

OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE SCHOOL v. 
MORRISSEY-BERRU 
Opinion of the Court 

pointed out by petitioners, determining whether a person 
is a “co-religionist” will not always be easy.  See Reply Brief 
14  (“Are  Orthodox  Jews  and  non-Orthodox  Jews  co-
religionists?  . . .  Would Presbyterians and Baptists be sim-
ilar enough?  Southern Baptists and Primitive Baptists?”).
Deciding such questions would risk judicial entanglement 
in religious issues.
  Expanding the “co-religionist” requirement, Brief for Re-
spondents 28–29, 44, to exclude those who no longer prac-
tice the faith would be even worse, post, at 13.  Would the 
test  depend  on  whether  the  person  in  question  no  longer 
considered himself or herself to be a member of a particular 
faith?  Or would the test turn on whether the faith tradition 
in question still regarded the person as a member in some 
sense? 

Respondents  argue  that  Morrissey-Berru  cannot  fall
within  the  Hosanna-Tabor  exception  because  she  said  in
connection with her lawsuit that she was not “a practicing 
Catholic,”  but  acceptance  of  that  argument  would  require
courts to delve into the sensitive question of what it means
to be a “practicing” member of a faith, and religious employ-
ers  would  be  put  in  an  impossible  position.    Morrissey-
Berru’s  employment  agreements  required  her  to  attest  to 
“good  standing”  with  the  church.  See  App.  91,  144,  154. 
Beyond insisting on such an attestation, it is not clear how 
religious  groups  could  monitor  whether  an  employee  is 
abiding by all religious obligations when away from the job. 
Was OLG supposed to interrogate Morrissey-Berru to con-
firm that she attended Mass every Sunday?

Respondents argue that the Hosanna-Tabor exception is
not workable unless it is given a rigid structure, but we de-
clined to adopt a “rigid formula” in Hosanna-Tabor, and the 
lower  courts  have  been  applying  the  exception  for  many
years without such a formula.  Here, as in Hosanna-Tabor, 
it is sufficient to decide the cases before us.  When a school