183076P.pdf   12/13/2019  Marianist Province of the U.S.  v.  City of Kirkwood
   U.S. Court of Appeals Case No:  18-3076
   U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri - St. Louis   
   [PUBLISHED] [Gruender, Author, with Benton and Shepherd, Circuit Judges] 
   Civil case - Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. In 
   Catholic school's challenge to city's zoning regulations in connection 
   with the school's lighting of its outdoor baseball diamond, the district 
   court did not err in determining that the regulations concerning lighting 
   and sound systems did not substantially burden the school's religious 
   exercise in violation of RLUIPA; the school's inability to use its 
   baseball field at night is a mere inconvenience and not a substantial 
   burden because there are alternative times and locations available to it; 
   school's "as-applied" claim that the school was not treated on equal terms 
   with the city's public high school rejected because the city's high 
   school's football lights and sound system were already in place at the 
   time the zoning regulations were passed in 2012; due to the dearth of case 
   law interpreting Missouri's Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the 
   district court abused its discretion in deciding this state law claim on 
   the merits after granting the city summary judgment on the school's RLUIPA 
   claims; the court should have declined jurisdiction over this pendent 
   state law claim and the matter is remanded with directions to dismiss this 
   claim without prejudice; inverse condemnation claim was properly dismissed 
   as the zoning regulations were a reasonable exercise of the city's police 
   power and did not constitute a taking or impose unusually restrictive 
   limitations.