Baptist Press: When I was in New York City last weekend, I learned about a huge inconsistent way that the city's public schools treat churches: Churches may not meet in public schools, but public schools can meet in churches.

ABC News (includes video): or the first time ever, gay-rights advocates will launch a sassy advertising campaign aimed at football fans in the most macho of American venues — the Super Bowl.

Palm Beach Post: After a heartfelt debate from both sides, the Florida Senate approved a measure authorizing student-led prayers at schools as long as adults are not involved.

Rosss Douthat at the NYTimes.com: But there are trade-offs as well, which liberal communitarians don’t always like to acknowledge. When government expands, it’s often at the expense of alternative expressions of community, alternative groups that seek to serve the common good.

Associated Baptist Press: “Our religious liberty is being similarly subverted and attacked,” Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said of the Obama administration’s inclusion of pregnancy in “preventive services” that health insurers must provide.

LifeSiteNews.com: s a formidable tide of Christian opposition began rising this week, including at least 115 U.S. bishops, the nation’s leading abortion lobby is leaping to defend the Obama administration order that will force religious institutions to provide free birth control next year.

LifeNews.com: In an email distributed by Human Events, a conservative publication, Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich takes the Obama administration to task of its new Obamacare mandate.

Religion Clause: Q What about the constitutional right to freedom of religion?... MR. CARNEY: I don’t believe there are any constitutional rights issues here, but I would refer you to others to discuss that. ... I understand that there’s controversy ... and we will continue to work with religious groups to discuss their concerns. But on the other side of this was the important need to provide access to women to the preventive services that they require....

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ADF Attorney Jonathan Scruggs appeared on Across America with Gary Freeman. | MP3 audio 21:29 mins

NY Daily News: In fact, if the city’s existing arguments against the churches weren’t dumb enough, Walcott just added another. He cited the involvement of a right-wing Arizona group fighting for equal access for churches — telling the Daily News that the Alliance Defense Fund is “not what we’re about as far as equal rights and equal opportunity.” Need we remind the schools chancellor that the mere fact that a conservative group defends a principle doesn’t mean that the principle isn’t worth defending?

Bill Berkowitz at The Huffington Post: Curious as to what this "Good News Club" was about, Stewart investigated and discovered that it was part of a nationwide effort sponsored by a conservative evangelical organization called the Child Evangelism Fellowship, a group aiming to "take back" America's public schools. Backing this effort, she found, are three long-term Christian Right-founded and funded legal enterprises: the Alliance Defense Fund, the Liberty Counsel and the American Center for Law and Justice.

FIRE - The Moral Liberal: Under the new policies, which were put into place after pressure from the Alliance Defense Fund, students may still reserve the table in the free speech zone, but may also speak elsewhere on campus spontaneously and without prior approval. The college also eliminated a speech code that banned "offensive" or "derogatory" speech.

R.R. Reno at First Things First Thoughts Blog: We seem to be in a season of judicial sanity. As Jeremy Tedesco, the lawyer who argued the case reports, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down a decision that vindicated the claims of Julea Ward.

National Organization for Marriage v. McKee, No. 11-1196 (1st Cir. Jan. 31, 2012) LIPEZ, Circuit Judge. This appeal presents the second chapter of a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Maine laws imposing registration and disclosure requirements on entities that finance election-related advocacy. In a recent decision, we rejected claims made by one of the appellants here, the National Organization for Marriage ("NOM"), asserting that Maine's laws regulating political action committees ("PACs") are unconstitutionally vague and overbroad in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments. See NOM v. McKee, 649 F.3d 34 (1st Cir. 2011) ("NOM I"). We now consider similar contentions raised by NOM and co-appellant American Principles in Action, Inc. ("APIA") concerning the law applicable to ballot question committees ("BQCs"). See Me. Rev. Stat. Ann. tit. 21-A, § 1056-B. Our decision in NOM I effectively disposes of most of appellants' challenges to Maine's BQC requirements. On the only substantively distinct issue — the constitutionality of the definition of "contribution" in section 1056-B — we conclude that the BQC law, like the PAC laws, is constitutional. We thus affirm in its entirety the district court's grant of summary judgment for the defendants.

The Daily Times: A week after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the Indian River School District's appeal of a ban on prayer at school board meetings, a small group of Sussex County residents continued delivering Christian prayers on behalf of the district.

GoLocalProv.com: Following up a federal court’s decision earlier this month finding unconstitutional the display of a prayer mural in Cranston High School West’s auditorium, Rhode Island ACLU attorneys have today asked the court to award $173,000 in attorneys’ fees and costs for their successful work on the case . . .

Liberty Counsel: U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) introduced a bill called the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012 that will expand the nearly nonexistent exemption for religious employers in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, commonly known as ObamaCare.

WAAYTV.com- Huntsville, Alabama Television (includes video): It all started when the board of education received a complaint from a family in the school system and the Freedom From Religion Foundation. They say the so-called "Bible Man"....who leads a program to help students earn Bibles should not be allowed because it's unconstitutional.

News from The Associated Press: The U.S. Forest Service says it will re-authorize a permit for a 57-year-old statue of Jesus that had been facing eviction from a northwestern Montana ski resort.