three or four years to this interesting case of trinity lutheran. a church in missouri ran a preschool. the state of missouri, two things about the state of missouri. one, state constitution provided that no state money should go to churches. number two, the state had a program where it would make recycled tires available to schools for realigning their playgrounds instead of pebbles or concrete, whatever. rubber tires on your playground. the amount of these tires that the schools had to apply for them and trinity lutheran applied to get on this tire program. they were rejected because they were a church. that was a pre-exercise question that came up. chief justice roberts wrote an opinion that was quite narrow. he said, this is really outrageous discrimination on the basis of religion. this churches being discriminated not because of anything it is doing, but because of what it is, a church. don't worry, we are only talking about playgrounds. this has nothing to do with anything else but are they eligible despite their nature is a church for this e

but there was a limited amount so they had to apply for them and trinity lutheran applied for the preschool to get on this entire program. so that was the free exercise question that came up. they said this is outrageous discrimination on the basis of religion. the church is being discriminated against not because of anything it's doing, but because of what it is, of church. don't worry, we are only talking about playgrounds. this case has nothing to do with anything else, but are they eligible despite their nature as a church for this tire program. so, just to writes a concurring opinion we cannot draw this distinction and what we are doing is authorizing public money to go to a church. he wasn't just in his first term, the first two or three armonths in april this was junef 2017 decision, but there is linda uses the case to show how it was a case only around playgrounds because it ends up being a ticket too much broader rulings as the years unfolded. ruth bader ginsburg were the only two on the far left to fully dissent from the case. she is part of the title and how and why you wrote thi

same story at nearby holy trinity lutheran church, where timothy weisman said he was heartbroken to cancel in-person worship. >> to come together for christmas is supposed to be a time of joy, of promise, of peace of grace. and i just can't imagine gathering people together and me worrying whether someone was going to contract a case because of that. >> reporter: across the country it's a second covid christmas. which for many means another holiday of streaming services online. >> i've joked that we have become televangelists over the past 18 months. >> reporter: with omicron fueling the latest surge, new yorkers waited in the outside for testing kits. >> i'm vaccinated twice, so i didn't get my booster yet, so this helps. >> reporter: even the unvaccinated were invited for mass at famous st. patrick's cathedral, which remained open with covid protocols. >> there will be a place for them to sit where there would be social distancing. >> reporter: covid-19 is also having a huge impact on the nation's blood supply. the american red cross says that centers across the country have less than a

espinosa and trinity lutheran made clear with respect to secular activities. there is room for variation. >> justice alito. >> if the program allowed parents to send their children to any accredited school anywhere in the country, which is what this program seems to allow with the exception of so-called sectarian schools, how would that cause strife? and add in, we are told that maine didn't rule out these schools for many, many years. the parents were permitted to send their children to those schools. was there a -- are you aware of a history of strife? it's one thing to say strife. could you explain in concrete terms how you see a potential for religious strife arising out of the acceptance of the petitioner's argument here? >> i think first to speak to the history briefly. until 19 -- it was in 1980 the maine attorney general first analyzed the question and the attorney general said, i think it would be unconstitutional under then-extant supreme court precedents to fund sectarian schools and he explained schools whose dominant purpose is the promotion of re

it becomes effectively the law and trinity lutheran and espinoza versus montana, where he repeats again the fact that it should -- we should not be weaponizing the establishment clause because it has neutrality and shouldn't be applied to the state settle -- to the states at all. there might be a distinction between being religious and doing religious things, which i don't understand the status. the court granted this term, can the state of maine exclude religious schools from a scholarship, a voucher of law? i think that is an area where his view of the establishment clause has come to be the law. >> i would say it goes even before that, to at least loretta lynch -- loretta lee opinion. -- plurality opinion. program provided computers, books, to all schools per capita -- on a per capita basis. this circuit held this was unconstitutional, by the way, not happily -- they said that the supreme court's jurisprudence was a vast wasteland. and the complained about how terrible it was, but said they were bound by this. the court split three ways with four justices sticking to the old jurispru

maybe you could actually have the methodists in the lutherans singing in the choir together. i tried to explain this to my colleagues in washington, d.c. more than once, but there is something about small towns where we still get along, and get along well enough to solve our problems. less so, unfortunately, in the nation's capital. we respect our nadir -- neighbors, we see them in the grocery store and at the football game on friday night. if we vote amongst ourselves like sometimes politics today, our towns would be a thing of the past. it's only that community working together that keeps the place alive. and we put our hands over our heart when the flag goes by, and we love our country. following the attack of december 7, 80 years ago this week, the values bob dole learned growing up in russell, led him to sign up and to swear an oath to protect and defend our nation. in the fall of 1944, lieutenant dole shipped out, and on april 14 of the next year, 1945, on the battlefield in the hills of italy, his life almost ended. it began here in russell and almost ended in a place