“Prince & Knight” on display with other LGBTQ genre books in Ridgeland, Mississippi at the city’s library, on January 27, 2022. Rogelio V. Solis/AP/File

The latest religious appeal to land at the Supreme Court came from a group of parents in Maryland who were denied an opportunity to opt their children out of reading LGBTQ books in elementary school.

As part of its English curriculum, the Montgomery County Public Schools district approved a handful of books in 2022. One, “Prince & Knight,” tells the story of a prince who does not want to marry any of the princesses in his realm. After teaming up with a knight to slay a dragon, the two fall in love, “filling the king and queen with joy,” according to the school’s summary.

The appeal arrived at the Supreme Court at a moment when conservatives, including President Donald Trump, have sought to roll back political and cultural gains made by LGBTQ Americans. Parents and schools, meanwhile, have been engaged in a tense struggle since the Covid-19 pandemic over how much sway families should have over public-school instruction.

But the case really has more to do with an effort by the Supreme Court’s conservative majority to rebalance the tension between the freedom of religious exercise and the First Amendment’s admonishment against government “establishment of religion.” Several of the justices have made clear in public statements and in opinions that they feel the government has gone so far in attempting to honor the principle of separating church and state that they have effectively wound up discriminating against religion.

The Richmond-based 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals cited the lack of clarity in siding with the schools 2-1 last year. But during the Supreme Court’s arguments in April, most of the conservative justices focused instead on the idea that parents are permitted to pull students out of all sorts of other discussions, such as sex education.

The Montgomery County Public Schools argued that an earlier effort to allow opt-outs when the books were in use was disruptive. And they say a win for the parents would create a slippery slope, allowing families that object to any number of classroom discussions to opt out of a wide range of curriculum they find offensive.