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Abstract

The Supreme Court’s June 2025 decision in Mahmoud v. Taylor unmistakably accomplished two things: it strengthened the Free Exercise Clause protections of the First Amendment, and it weakened the ability of schools to press an ideological agenda on matters of human sexuality and gender identity when the materials substantially interfere with the religious development of children. After Montgomery County refused to exercise its discretion to give parents notice and the right to opt their elementary-aged children out of objectional material concerning gender identity and sexual orientation, several parents and a non-profit organization sued, alleging free exercise and parental rights claims. The United States Supreme Court only reached the free exercise claim, leaving until another day the parental rights question.

For years, lower court decisions have afforded broad discretion to school officials to require student attendance at sexually explicit school-sponsored events or instruction that parents found objectionable. Some federal circuit courts have gone so far as to say that the only choice parents have is whether to send their child to public schools and that once parents drop their children off at school, it is the school that decides what the students should be taught, regardless of parental objection. Those decisions represent the mindset that government, not parents, has the primary responsibility to raise children. Scripture, however, makes clear that the opposite is true: God has given parents the responsibility to “[t]rain up a child in the way he should go” and to impress the truths of Scripture on children at all times and places.

In Mahmoud, the Supreme Court strengthened Free Exercise Clause claims, concluding that even if a law is neutral and generally applicable, it still is subject to strict scrutiny when it imposes a burden “of the same character as that imposed in Yoder.” That burden exists when the government “substantially interfer[es] with the religious development of the [parents’] child[ren]” and “poses ‘a very real threat of undermining’ the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill” in their children. Significantly, the Court concluded that substantial interference exists even if children are not forced to abandon or disclaim their religious beliefs.

This Article explains the Mahmoud decision, discusses the decision’s implications for future parent-school instructional conflicts, and identifies important questions left unresolved.

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