INDIANAPOLIS, IN – This week, an Indiana school district agreed to pay $650,000 to settle a religious discrimination lawsuit from a former music teacher who was forced to resign for refusing to violate his religious beliefs by using inconsistent pronouns for gender-confused students. 

In August 2025, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Brownsburg School District should face a jury trial for how it treated former teacher John Kluge, who is represented by Alliance Defending Freedom. For the basis of its decision, the Seventh Circuit used the 2023 U.S. Supreme Court Groff v. DeJoy ruling, which says employers must honor religious accommodations under Title VII that do not present any undue hardship on the organization. 

In 2017, the school district began mandating teachers refer to gender-confused students using pronouns and names that were inconsistent with their sex. Initially, the district granted Kluge a religious accommodation under Title VII to refer to all his students by their last names. After a few students complained, the district revoked his accommodation and forced him to resign in 2021.

After the Seventh Circuit ordered the case before a jury to decide whether Kluge’s accommodation was an undue burden—potentially exposing Brownsburg School District to substantial liability for a Title VII violation—the district chose to settle.

Liberty Counsel also has several active, similar Title VII cases involving religious discrimination against Christian employees.

Recently, Liberty Counsel filed charges of discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on behalf of bi-vocational Pastor Luke Ash who was unlawfully fired from his job as a library services technician for refusing to use false pronouns for a female colleague. The discrimination charges are against the City of Baton Rouge, Louisiana and the East Baton Rouge Parish Library. The next step is for the EEOC to review the charges and investigate the library’s discriminatory employment practices. 

The library’s “inclusivity policy” purports that employees have a “right” to choose their pronouns, which essentially mandates radical gender ideology and unconstitutionally compels employees to mouth their support in acceptance. However, Pastor Ash’s sincere religious beliefs that “gender identity” is inconsistent with God’s design for human sexuality prevent him from believing that a female worker is a man regardless of how she wishes to identify. As a Christian minister, he must speak truth and believes lying would cause harm to others, especially those experiencing gender confusion. When his library supervisors showed him the policy, Pastor Ash told them he was not going to lie. Shortly thereafter, Pastor Ash was fired according to the “inclusivity policy.” 

In a separate case, Liberty Counsel is seeking an injunction against the University of Arizona on behalf of former ethics Professor Daniel Grossenbach who was unlawfully fired for publicly advocating for parental rights at local school board meetings where his children attend school. The public school district is not affiliated with the university, yet the university fired him based on anonymous complaints about his religious speech and advocacy there. Liberty Counsel states the university discriminated and retaliated against him for exercising his First Amendment rights to speak out according to his religious beliefs and to protect his children. 

Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, “Title VII requires employers to provide reasonable religious accommodations to their employees. Schools and state organizations cannot force people to choose between their faith and their livelihood. Brownsburg School District made a costly mistake, and now the East Baton Rouge Parish Library and the University of Arizona also need to be held accountable.”

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