As a plaintiff, you have to be concerned when the first sentence of the court’s opinion says you filed a complaint for discrimination stemming from a nonprofit’s failure to hire you to a position for which you do not recall applying.

A divided 7^th Circuit Court of Appeals has held that the “ministerial exception” preventing a variety of employment claims against churches and other religious organizations also prevents a minister from bringing a claim for a hostile work environment.  In a 7-3 decision of the full Court, it has affirmed a District Court dismissal of a claim for wrongful termination, and reversed the District Court’s decision that would have allowed the employee to proceed on a hostile work environment claim.

An alleged hate group may be rejected from the Amazon Smiles donation to charity program, the 11^th Circuit Court of Appeals has held.  The Court has affirmed the District Court decision holding that the Southern Poverty Law Center did not defame the group and that Amazon did not discriminate on the basis of religion.

A plaintiff seeking damages for defamation from the Southern Poverty Law Center, a 501(c)(3) charitable organization, has no standing to seek a declaratory judgment that the SPLC misused its charitable exempt status, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed in an unpublished opinion.  The Court denied both the claim for standing and the claim that he was defamed by being called a “Neo-Nazi Lawyer.”

A Pennsylvania appellate court has affirmed the denial of state sales tax exemption to a Quaker-based senior living community that provides independent living and skilled nursing care.  The Court has agreed that the facility does not provide gratuitously a substantial part of its services.

Friends Boarding Home in Kennett Square is a 501(c)(3) charity formed in 1901 to provide a home for aged or infirm persons of limited means at moderate cost.  In 2017, it sought an exemption from the Department of Revenue as “an institution of purely public charity.”