Current Call for Submissions

In addition to its regular content explaining and commenting on a wide range of topics, Canopy Forum also publishes thematic series addressing issues at the intersection of law and religion from a range of perspectives. These series explore important current concerns through a series of essays or other multimedia content published over the course of several days or weeks, and aim to spark further conversations among our readers about how best to think about and deliberate on these questions.

Executive Branch Developments in Law and Religion

The Trump Administration executive branch has recently issued new executive orders affecting law and religion at the executive branch. First, the Internal Revenue Service recently announced a carve-out for religious organizations, allowing them to endorse political candidates without losing their tax-exempt status. This policy overturns 60 years of a ban on partisan activity by religious organizations under the Johnson Amendment. Second, the Office of Personnel Management issued a memo permitting federal workers to express and promote their religious beliefs in the workplace. These federal developments raise new significant issues of partisanship and proselytization, among others, and we seek essays on the following questions:

• What are the arguments for and against allowing religious organizations to make political endorsements?
• What do religious clergy and organizations across a range of traditions think about the prospect of making political endorsements?
• To what extent do the new OPM rules expand religious expression in the workplace beyond what is currently allowed?
• How will federal and potentially other workplaces manage this new religious accommodation?
• How are these new religious permissions likely to be addressed by Congress and/or the federal judiciary as coequal branches of government?

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis; however, we would prefer submissions for this call by September 30th. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

Funding Private Religious Schools

In St. Isidore Catholic Virtual School v. Drummond, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the question whether state governments can prohibit religious charter school from using public funds under the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. In a split 4-4 decision, with Justice Amy Coney Barrett notably recused, the Court upheld the Oklahoma Supreme Court’s decision to prohibit public funds going to religious schools, but without setting a nationwide precedent, since the participating court members were evenly divided in the per curiam opinion.

• What does the decision say about the viability of the Establishment Clause?
• What was the effect of Justice Barrett’s recusal at a time when there has been scrutiny of judicial ethics at the Court, with some arguing that recusal does not happen enough?
• What issues did the case raise about the funding of public and private schools in a time of increasing voucher programs and what some see as privatization of public education, with religious arguments both for and against privatization?
• What does the divided court and per curiam decision suggest about the implications and applications of the decision going forward?
• Other issues and aspects of the case pertaining to the interaction of law and religion, particularly in the area of religion and education.

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis; however, we would prefer submissions for this call by September 1st. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

Tax Exemption for Religious Charities

In Catholic Charities v. Wisconsin Labor and Industry Board, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that denial of an employment tax exemption to Catholic Charities violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The Court found that the denial of exemption was unconstitutional discrimination against a religious organization based on its religious activities.

• What does the decision say about the viability of the Establishment Clause?
• How was Catholic Charities’ argument from the principle of church autonomy received and addressed by the Court?
• How did the Court’s unanimous opinion, written by Justice Sotomayor, rely on the principle of denominational neutrality address Catholic Charities’ argument that it was being unfairly discriminated against for its practices of non-proselytization and service of people of all faiths?
• What issues were addressed in the separate concurring opinions of Justices Thomas and Jackson, two justices of differing ideological commitments, and what are the implications of these positions going forward?
• Other issues and aspects of the case pertaining to the interaction of law and religion, particularly in the areas of religious exemptions in tax and employment law.

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis; however, we would prefer submissions for this call by September 1st. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

Parental Opt-Outs from Educational Programs

In Mahmoud v. Taylor, the U.S. Supreme Court held that a Maryland school district’s policy of not allowing parental opt-outs to remove their children from instruction involving LGBTQ-themed storybooks was a violation of the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.

• As the one case focusing on the Free Exercise Clause before the Court this term, how does this case limit or expand, if at all, the Court’s free exercise jurisprudence?
• How does the decision translate into the jurisprudence surrounding other religion and education issues, such as curricular objections, books in school libraries, required religious displays (e.g. Ten Commandments) in classrooms, and other recent legislation and policies concerning religion in schools?
• What are the implications of the case for efforts to promote religious pluralism and understanding of other kinds of diversity in schools?

Other issues and aspects of the case pertaining to the interaction of law and religion, particularly in the area of religion and education. Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis; however, we would prefer submissions for this call by September 1st. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

Democracy or Autocracy: Law and Religion Responses

In a call at the end of 2024, Canopy Forum called for essays on resources supportive of democracy in Christianity to counter narratives of Christian nationalism. But as 2024 shifted into 2025, global concerns about autocracy rising and democracy waning have continued to dominate discussions in both law and religion. In Christian terms, we may be in a new “Bonhoeffer moment.”

Regarding Christianity’s relationship with democracy, John Witte, Jr. puts it presciently:

Christian theologies have helped to cultivate democratic ideals of equality, liberty, and responsibility. But they have also helped to perpetuate repressive ideas of statism, elitism, and chauvinism. In the future, traditional Christian attitudes and actions concerning democracy will face formidable challenges—both from inside and outside the Christian community.

However, concerns about autocracy and democracy are hardly uniquely Christian. It is possible that much of the same could be said for Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, indigenous and other religious traditions around the world. With this in mind, we call for essays on the following topics:

• How does religion in general or particular religions support or oppose democracy, both within the religion itself and as a mode of civil and national governance?
• What theological concepts, ethical teachings, and social movements support democracy in particular religious traditions?
• What legal and political frameworks do religions posit or promote as religious alternatives to democracy?
• Are there anti-democratic tendencies and dimensions of religion and how do these manifest themselves in law and society?
• How are legal and religious professionals and groups working for democracy in society or leaning toward autocracy?

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

Law and Religion in Popular Culture

In previous decades, movies and television program, such as “The Firm,” “The Pelican Brief,” “L.A. Law,” “Homicide,” “The Good Wife,” and others explored issues of law and religion and may have inspired some future lawyers to go into the field. (“Law and Order” alone, not to mention its various spinoffs, ran for twenty seasons before being revived in 2022 after an eleven-year hiatus. Today, genres from horror films to music videos trade in normative tropes and themes of law, religion, justice, and spirituality.

With this in mind we seek essays that explore:

• Legal and religious themes (or both) together in popular culture of any genre
• Portrayals of lawyers and clergy in popular culture
• Explorations of faith, spirituality, and justice in popular culture
• Law and religion in plot lines, imagery, sounds, and other aspects of various genres of popular culture.

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

“Looking Back” In Law and Religion

In recent years, some jurisdictions have created or reinstated “look-back” statutes extending the period within which survivors, particularly of sexual violence or child sexual abuse. These statutes are justified as responses to the long periods of time that it can take for survivors to come forward to report these crimes or to grow up to be adults who can pursue their claims in court. However, “look-back” statutes have been criticized for unsettling the law by allowing claims to proceed long after probative witnesses, evidence, and memories may have become difficult to access. Additionally, many of the “look-back” cases involve claims against religious bodies that can be costly to insure and defend against. Some religious groups have sought to address these claims within religious bodies and through religious law, rather than through civil and criminal law, with varying effects. And recently, the supreme court in the state of Louisiana overturned “look-back” laws in a ruling that they then reconsidered.

Law and religion may have distinctive, but sometimes overlapping, understandings of time, memory, agency, and responsibility for addressing cases of past wrongs. With this in mind we call for essays that explore: 

• Theological and ethical concepts that inform how secular or civil law and religious traditions or institutions adjudicate past crimes and wrongs.
• Perspectives on the function and operation of “look-back” laws in cases of sexual abuse involving religious organizations. 
• Assessments of defenses and criticisms of “look-back” laws from both legal and religious perspectives. 
• Defenses and opposition to “look-back” laws by religious organization defendants and the lawyers they employ.
• Efficacy of “look-back” laws under criminal theories of retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, and justice. 

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

New Topics in Law and Religion

Canopy Forum seeks short articles and multimedia submissions that introduce our readers to new and emerging topics in law and religion. We are currently accepting submissions that address the following:

• Relationships between law and religion in global perspective with topics including but not limited to immigration, education, policy-making, religious freedom or persecution, voting rights, family law, military conflict, the environment, or other issues pertaining to law, religion, and public policy
• Other matters – historical or contemporary – that shed light on the intersections of law and religion 

Submissions will be considered for publication on a rolling basis. Submit your essay at canopyforum@emory.edu.

Please send general inquires and submit contributions to
canopyforum@emory.edu

Canopy Forum welcomes submissions from experts in the field(s) of law and religion, as well as other relevant disciplines, such as theology, ethics, philosophy, anthropology, sociology, political science, history, and other fields. Submissions should be between 1,500-2,500 words (though longer pieces may be considered) and written in a generally accessible style, with embedded links rather than footnotes for supporting materials. When referencing sources, we encourage contributors to use hyperlinks. Additionally, court decisions should be linked once to the first reference to that case, using the full case name (i.e., “In its recent ruling in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, the Supreme Court held …”), and, whenever possible, link to the case’s page on the SCOTUS Religion Cases database. Academic papers and presentations should be adapted or rewritten accordingly.