Utah religious leaders declare worship spaces off-limits to guns

Published: 2004-01-20

SALT LAKE CITY (CNS) -- Salt Lake City's Catholic bishop and more than 30 other religious leaders have told Utah government officials it is not the state's place to make policy for churches, synagogues, mosques, temples or the ward houses of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- even when it comes to a law allowing people to carry concealed weapons. At a December press conference, Bishop George H. Niederauer and other religious leaders responded to a new state requirement that religious communities must register with a state agency if they intend to keep their houses of worship free from the intrusion of weapons. A joint statement from the religious leaders said, "Anyone who attends any of our services carrying a concealed weapon under any law allowing them to do so will be asked to leave our property and return only after safely storing that weapon elsewhere." It added, "The state of Utah is presuming to tell the various religious institutions in the state that we can do what we have been doing for millennia. More than presumptuous, the state is inserting itself into the very right to religious freedom upon which our nation was founded -- our right to worship as we please."

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