Courts, Church Disputes, and the First Amendment

Just like other organizations, churches can sue and be sued.  Much of the time religious doctrine is not relevant to the dispute, such as when a contractor does a shoddy job building the sanctuary, when the church’s neighbor contests a boundary, or when the church’s van gets into a collision.  But sometimes disputes can hinge on, or at least involve, the organization’s beliefs, principles, creeds, or canons.  Usually that happens in internal disagreements—actions among the church and its members, officers, directors, or leaders; or between an individual assembly and the larger organizing body.  In such cases, the authority of secular courts to decide the outcome is sharply limited by the Free Exercise and Establishment clauses of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.