Source: First Amendment Center Press Release
Wire Service: AP
http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/news.aspx?id=18342
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 1993 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.