Supreme Court hears clash between Catholic preschools, Colorado over ‘universal’ program
The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments over whether Catholic preschools in Colorado may participate in the state’s universal preschool funding program. Two Archdiocese of Denver parishes say Colorado excluded their preschools because they require families and staff to acknowledge Catholic teachings on marriage, sexuality and gender. Colorado argues the schools conflict with the program’s rule barring discrimination based on a child’s or family’s sexual orientation or gender identity. A lawyer for the schools said the requirement reflects their religious beliefs; Justice Sonia Sotomayor questioned whether the schools were choosing not to participate rather than being excluded.
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The Supreme Court heard arguments in a dispute over whether two Catholic preschools may participate in Colorado’s publicly funded universal preschool program while adhering to their religious requirements. The case pits the schools’ claims of religious discrimination against Colorado’s position that publicly funded providers must follow the program’s nondiscrimination rules.
Colorado’s program provides up to about $6,000 to help parents send children to a preschool of their choice, including private and religious schools. Two Catholic parishes in the Archdiocese of Denver say the state excluded their preschools because they require faculty and parents to acknowledge the Church’s teachings on marriage, sexuality and gender in a “statement of community beliefs.”
Colorado says participating schools may not deny admission to a child because of the child’s or family’s sexual orientation or gender identity. Deputy Solicitor General Helen Norton told the justices that religious and secular schools alike must meet the same conditions, and that the program is neutral toward religion.
Representing the schools, Becket senior counsel Nicholas Reaves said they seek families willing to be open to and supportive of Catholic teaching, and argued that Colorado’s policy prevents families from using program funds at those schools. Justice Sonia Sotomayor challenged the claim of exclusion, saying the schools were choosing not to participate because they would not receive an exemption; Reaves responded that the requirement applies to all families and is not based on who they are.
Sotomayor characterized the policy as excluding children whose parents are homosexual. Reaves said families, including Catholic families, must agree to the statement in good faith.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh asked whether Colorado’s position was consistent with allowing single-sex preschools to participate. Norton replied that biological sex is not among the characteristics specified in the program’s nondiscrimination law. Chief Justice John Roberts said the policy’s effect appeared similar to a Maine law the court struck down in 2022 in Carson v. Makin, which had excluded religious schools from a public tuition-assistance program.
The Human Rights Campaign argued that schools taking public funds should not be able to turn away LGBTQ+ families, and said Colorado’s nondiscrimination condition should be upheld. After arguments, Reaves said Colorado was effectively requiring Catholic schools to abandon their religious practice to participate.
The court is expected to issue its decision by the end of its term, typically in June.
Religious liberty and equal access to public education funding
Catholic teaching frames religious liberty and public education funding around two connected rights: parents’ freedom to choose an education consistent with their convictions, and the equal treatment of families and schools that seek to provide it. On that basis, Catholic sources support public assistance for non-state schools as a matter of justice, while recognizing that the state may define the educational purpose and conditions of a program. The available material does not establish the precise facts or eventual outcome of the Colorado preschool dispute; it does provide principles for understanding the issue.
The Church regards parents as having primary responsibility for their children’s education. Their choice of school is therefore not merely a consumer preference: it can be an exercise of conscience and religious freedom. A Vatican document says that the right to education is closely linked to parents’ right to choose the kind of education and school they want for their children, and that genuine choice requires avoiding undue financial burdens. It also argues that public support should respond to the educational aspirations of citizens, within the limits of the common good.
A USCCB letter likewise describes parents as the first and primary teachers of their children, and says public authorities should ensure that families can actually exercise their right to choose a school consistent with their convictions. In this view, a right that exists only on paper may be inadequate if families cannot realistically afford the available option.
This does not mean Catholic teaching rejects public schools or requires every family to choose a religious school. The Church recognizes a plural system of educational options and says the Catholic school contributes to that variety; it rejects, in principle, a state monopoly that leaves families without a meaningful alternative.
A central question is whether a government may exclude a school from a generally available public benefit because it is religious, or because it will use the assistance in a way connected with its religious identity. The Catholic principle emphasized in these documents is that public authorities should allocate educational subsidies so that parents can genuinely choose schools according to conscience. A Vatican document on Catholic schools puts the point directly:
“The public authority, therefore, whose duty it is to protect and defend the liberty of the citizens, is bound according to the principle of distributive justice to ensure that public subsidies are so allocated that parents are truly free to select schools for their children in accordance with their conscience”.
“Distributive justice” means allocating public resources fairly in view of the common good and people’s legitimate claims. Applied to education, the Catholic argument is that families who choose a non-state school should not automatically be denied access to public assistance available to other families, particularly when that assistance is directed to a public educational purpose. Pope Pius XI argued that in societies with different religious beliefs, public authorities could support families’ and the Church’s educational initiatives while respecting religious liberty and the common good.
This is a principle, not a claim that every Catholic school or preschool must receive every form of government funding on any terms. Governments may set reasonable standards for programs and use public resources to pursue legitimate educational goals. The Catholic concern is whether program rules unfairly make religious identity or religious practice a disqualifying condition, or whether they leave families without a genuine, affordable choice.
The supplied news summary says that the Supreme Court heard a dispute involving Catholic preschools and Colorado’s universal preschool program. In Catholic terms, the key issue is not simply whether a religious school may receive public money. It is whether families and providers are treated equally within a public program, and whether the program’s conditions respect the religious liberty of parents and institutions.
There is a meaningful distinction between a program’s educational requirements and a condition that effectively excludes religious participation. A state may define what services a funded preschool must provide. But if a school is otherwise eligible and is excluded because it is religious, or because it seeks to conduct its program consistently with its religious convictions, the dispute raises the equal-access and religious-liberty concerns reflected in the Catholic sources. The USCCB letter summarizes U.S. Supreme Court decisions as holding that public benefits cannot be denied to religious schools and families on religious grounds, including where a school intends to use funds in connection with its religious mission.
The Catholic sources do not supply the Colorado program’s detailed eligibility rules, the schools’ specific claims, or the arguments made at the hearing. So they cannot establish whether the program’s conditions are neutral, whether the schools satisfy all other requirements, or how the legal dispute should be resolved. Those details matter: a general principle of equal access does not by itself settle every question about how a particular preschool program is structured.
Catholic teaching also rejects the idea that public support must require a religious school to become religiously neutral. The Church sees the Catholic school as a place where faith is handed on, and says educational pluralism should include schools that reflect families’ convictions. At the same time, an older Catholic argument by Isaac Hecker distinguishes funding education the state regards as necessary for citizenship from funding religious instruction itself: in his proposal, the state would pay for the public educational component, while religious instruction would remain voluntarily supported.
That distinction helps explain the debate, but it should not be mistaken for a complete statement of current U.S. law or a ruling on Colorado’s program. The sources present a Catholic case for fair access, parental choice, and religious liberty; they do not establish that every funding arrangement must use Hecker’s particular model.
The underlying Catholic claim is that genuine religious freedom includes more than permission to hold beliefs privately. It includes room for families and religious communities to educate children in accordance with their convictions, and—where public education assistance is made available—to seek its fair application without discrimination. That claim remains subject to the common good and the legitimate rules of public programs. In the Colorado dispute, therefore, the central question is whether the state’s conditions fairly govern a public preschool benefit or instead penalize religious schools and the families who choose them. The information supplied here is not sufficient to determine which description best fits the facts of the case.