The U.S. Supreme Court begins its new term on Oct. 5, 2026. One of the cases that the justices have agreed to hear is a First Amendment religious liberty case, St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy.

The case arose because Colorado’s new Universal Preschool Program only provides funding to preschools that agree to abide by a nondiscrimination policy. That policy forbids, among other things, denying admission because of a student’s or parent’s sexual orientation or gender identity.

Two Catholic parishes in the Archdiocese of Denver – St. Mary in Littleton and St. Bernadette in Lakewood – challenged that requirement and sued. They, along with Catholic parents who joined the lawsuit, argue that the nondiscrimination policy violated their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion.

As a constitutional law scholar with a forthcoming book about legal cases that pit First Amendment rights against LGBTQ rights, I consider St. Mary v. Roy to be significant for multiple reasons.

This case brings together major themes from recent Supreme Court cases about religion’s role in public life, especially in education. All these cases deal with the First Amendment, which protects both freedom of speech and freedom of religion, along with several other rights.

But St. Mary is also significant for another, perhaps more surprising reason: It is yet another case from Colorado.

Throughout its history, the Supreme Court has considered less than a dozen cases that address, even tangentially, how to balance free speech or religious freedom with protections for the LGBTQ community. Yet Colorado has been the source of five of these cases over a 30-year period.

One of the earliest Supreme Court decisions recognizing constitutional protection for queer people was Romer v. Evans, a 1996 case from........

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