With only eight justices voting, the 4-4 tie leaves in place an Oklahoma Supreme Court ruling that a public religious charter school would violate the separation of church and state.

A divided Supreme Court rejected a plan on Thursday to allow Oklahoma to use government money to run the nation’s first religious charter school, which would teach a curriculum infused by Catholic doctrine.

The case, a major test of the separation of church and state, was an unexpected loss for those advocating a greater role for religion in public life.