Lawsuit over animal sacrifice highlights religious clashes

EULESS, Texas—On many Sunday mornings Jose Merced watches police officers directing traffic into and from overflowing church parking lots and realizes his own religion doesn’t evoke the same friendly treatment.

When police came to his home on a quiet cul-de-sac in this Fort Worth suburb last summer, it was to demand that Merced—an Oba, or priest of the Santeria faith— call off a religious ceremony planned for the next day.

The reason: the city’s ban on animal slaughter.

Merced explained that the ritual sacrifice of an animal is necessary to initiate a new priest into the Santeria faith, which has its origins in Cuba. He also offered a copy of a Supreme Court ruling allowing such sacrifices for religious reasons.

But Euless officials insisted that municipal sanitation ordinances prohibit the slaughter of animals inside city limits.

Such conflicts have become more common recently as the United States becomes a more religiously diverse society. Immigrants have also brought new religions with practices that fall outside the Judeo-Christian mainstream.

The case highlights how laws in place in towns and cities across the U.S. sometimes clash with evolving cultural and religious customs.

Merced has sued the city, saying the slaughter ban encroaches on his right to perform religious ceremonies at his home.

“It’s just ignorance … They shut the door on me,” Merced said.

In some places, authorities have worked to accommodate religious practices of new residents. Other times, participants have met with opposition, said Jeremy Gunn, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief.

“Most political societies are very accommodating to the majority practice, but not to minority religions,” Gunn said.

For example:

A Canadian Amish man married to an American citizen was barred from re-entering the U.S. in 2004 without photo identification. A federal court later rejected his argument that the requirement conflicted with the group’s interpretation of a Biblical prohibition against making graven images and violated his religious rights.

A Sikh college student in Michigan was arrested in 2005 for carrying a 10-inch (25-centimeters) knife, called a kirpan. Carrying a kirpan at all times is a basic tenet of the Sikh religion. Authorities later dropped the charge against Sukhpreet Singh Garcha.

A Hmong shaman was convicted of a felony in California after the clubbing of a puppy sacrificed to cure his ill wife. The charge against Chia Thai Moua was reduced in 1996 to a misdemeanor.

Euless spokeswoman Betsy Boyett said her city’s slaughtering ban is intended to protect the health and safety of residents.

But believers say animal sacrifices are an essential devotion in Santeria, a religion born in Cuba by Yoruba slaves who fused elements of Roman Catholicism with beliefs they brought with them from Africa. Adherents later brought Santeria to the U.S. during the Cuban revolution.

Santerians believe in spiritual forces called Orishas, whose survival depends on blood sacrifices.

During the rite, an animal’s carotid artery is severed, letting blood fall on a shrine. The animal is then prepared and eaten. Only those participating in the ceremony may be present.