The U.S. Supreme Court has unanimously held that the state of Wisconsin violated religious freedom when it denied a tax exemption to a Catholic charity after claiming that the group’s undertakings were not “primarily” religious.

The state allows organizations “operated primarily for religious purposes” to be exempt from paying into the state’s unemployment system. But the charity was denied this status because it offers its services to people of all faiths and does not focus its efforts on converting the people it serves to Catholicism.

The Catholic Charities Bureau is the social ministry arm of the Catholic diocese in the city of Superior and it provides “services to the poor, the disadvantaged, the disabled, the elderly and children with special needs”. It does not discriminate on the basis of religion or require the recipients of its charity to be Catholic.

The ruling means that religious freedom doesn’t apply narrowly to the worship and evangelising aspect of churches, but also applies to their social outreach.