Mealey's (February 8, 2017, 12:53 PM EST) -- WASHINGTON, D.C. — The United States on Jan. 24 in an amicus brief asked the U.S. Supreme Court to follow the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Labor and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.’s longstanding conclusion that a plan need only be “maintained” by a qualifying church-affiliated organization and not be “established” by a church to qualify for the church plan exemption to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (Advocate Health Care Network, et al. v. Maria Stapleton, et al., No. 16-74, Saint Peter’s Healthcare System, et al. v. Laurence Kaplan, No. 16-86, Dignity Health, et al. v. Starla Rollins, No. 16-258, U.S. Sup.)....