The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has set Jan. 27 to hear oral arguments in the appeal of a federal court ruling that found Rowan County commissioners’ prayers before meetings unconstitutional.

The earlier ruling resulted from a lawsuit filed in 2013 by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of Rowan County residents Nan Lund, Robert Voelker, and Liesa Montag-Siegel. The suit argued the county’s practice violated the Constitution because they coerced public participation in prayers that overwhelmingly advanced beliefs specific to one religion.

A federal judge ruled against Rowan County commissioners, but the board voted to appeal. The case may be the first time a federal appeals court has reviewed a government prayer policy since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the invocation practice of Greece, New York, was constitutional. In his May 2015 ruling, U.S. District Judge James Beaty ruled that Rowan County’s prayer practice “falls outside of the prayer practices approved in the [U.S. Supreme Court decision] in Town of Greece.”

In Greece, officials invited religious leaders to give prayers for the benefit of board members at the start of meetings. People of different religious traditions delivered those invocations, and the board members themselves never directed residents to participate in the prayers. In Rowan County, the officials themselves deliver the prayers.