The Crucible
Issue 29 | Tuesday, April 28, 2026 | The Cultural Front
– 3 min read
The State Just Said No to Faith. The Supreme Court Will Decide Who's Right.
THE BRIEF
On April 20, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a case that will force a direct answer to a question the culture has been asking in a dozen different ways for a decade: does the authority of the state extend to the rooms where people of faith form the next generation?
Colorado says yes. Two Christian preschools say no. The Supreme Court will decide in the fall.
The legal question matters. The formation question is more urgent.
THE CULTURAL FRONT
What the State Is Claiming
Colorado is not claiming the schools are bad schools. It is claiming that schools which operate according to Christian convictions about the human person are not eligible to participate in a public benefit available to everyone else.
That is a claim about authority. The state's convictions about gender and family structure supersede the church's authority to form children according to its own convictions — at least in any room that touches public funding.
What the State Has Been Getting Wrong
The Supreme Court has been correcting this error consistently for a decade — Trinity Lutheran (2017), Espinoza (2020), Carson v. Makin (2022). Same pattern every time: a government program open to everyone else closed to institutions operating on religious convictions. Same result every time: the Court ruled against the exclusion.
Colorado is attempting it again. The trajectory is predictable. What is not predictable is whether the Court will use this case to narrow a 1990 precedent that has limited religious accommodation for 35 years — a ruling that, if narrowed, would significantly expand the space for formed believers to operate in every sphere of public life.
What This Reveals About the Formation War
The rooms where children are formed are the most contested rooms in the culture. This is not a coincidence.
The state understands something about formation that the church sometimes forgets: the people who shape the early years shape the person. What a child learns about what it means to be human — about the body, about identity, about the nature of truth — does not stay in the classroom. It becomes the operating system for everything that follows.
The state's attempt to exclude Christian preschools is not primarily a budget dispute. It is a dispute about who has the authority to answer the formation questions that matter most.
A formed Guardian understands this clearly. The authority to form children according to the truth about the human person was not granted by the state and cannot be revoked by it. It is a prior authority — rooted in the same source as every other authority the week has been naming. The state can restrict access to funding. It cannot restrict access to what the formed person carries.
What to Do With It
Know the case. It will be argued in the fall. The Becket Fund's track record in front of this Court is strong. The legal trajectory favors the schools.
But the formation work does not wait for the ruling. The authority to form the next generation is exercised in homes, in churches, in classical Christian schools, in neighborhoods, and in the ordinary conversations where a formed person passes something real on to the person in front of them. The state can contest the funding. It cannot contest the formation that is already happening.
Build in the rooms you have. The ruling will come. The formation cannot wait for it.
THE GUARDIAN'S TAKEAWAY
A state that excludes people of faith from public life because of their convictions has claimed authority it does not have. The courts have said so repeatedly. They will say so again.
But the formed person already knew this — not because the Court said so, but because the authority they carry was given before Colorado existed and does not depend on its permission to operate.
The legal terrain matters. Know it. The formation terrain is where the actual work happens. Stay in it.
FROM THE BLOG
Monday — The Organization That Judged Everyone Else Just Got Indicted documents the same pattern: authority claimed over Christian institutions that was never legitimately held.
The Organization That Judged Everyone Else Just Got Indicted
The SPLC spent decades labeling Christian organizations as hate groups. Federal agencies, corporations, and platforms followed its lead. Last Tuesday it was indicted for fraud. The authority it wielded was borrowed — and it always was.
LEARN MORE
- Becket Fund for Religious Liberty — Full case details. Visit here →
- AP — "Supreme Court to Hear Religious Preschools Case" — Primary news account. Read here →
- Every Square Inch — Bruce Riley Ashford. The clearest Protestant framework for Christian engagement across every sphere of culture including education. Find it here →
CLOSING CHARGE
The state is contesting the rooms where the next generation is formed. The Court has been saying no for years.
The formed believer does not wait for the ruling to keep building. The authority was given. The rooms are open. The formation is happening right now — with or without Colorado's permission.
Build in the rooms you have.
Carry the Cross.
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