The latest attention-grabbing cases come from New York and California. The Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the New York case means Catholic Charities has to continue subsidizing employees’ contraception against its religious beliefs. And, thanks to the abandoned case in California, a church group no longer has the right to meet at a public library. Jordan Lorence with the Alliance Defense Fund speculates why the high court turned them away.

“They may think that there’s other cases that would be better that they want to take. They may be concerned that there’s not a majority to go the right way.”

Thousands of other cases appealed to the Supreme Court are being declined as well. That’s why Bruce Hausknecht with Focus on the Family Action doesn’t think it’s based on religious animosity, however…

“We’re seeing in this case, particularly in my opinion, the loss of some of our religious liberties that the Supreme Court should be taking on and reversing in these cases.”

He hopes religious freedom cases become the High Court’s top priority before those rights fade away all together. Jay Sekulow with the American Center for Law and Justice is among several groups giving the justices that opportunity.

“These controversies continue so it’s not like the Supreme Court can ignore this forever. I’ve got two cases we’re bringing up to the court at the end of November that are a little bit different but they are religious liberty cases.”

The Supreme Court justices gave no indication of why they turned these cases away.