ATLANTA - A state law prohibiting guns in churches violates the Constitutional rights to free religion and the right to bear arms, according to a central Georgia minister and a group of gun rights advocates filing a lawsuit against the state.

The lawsuit being filed in the Superior Court of Upson County comes less than two weeks after a sweeping U.S. Supreme Court decision supporting Americans' right to keep and bear arms, which some predicted would trigger efforts to overturn state gun laws for years to come.

"The ban on carrying firearms in churches - we're seeking to have it declared unconstitutional on both First and Second Amendment grounds," attorney John Monroe said Friday.

He is filing the suit on behalf of the Rev. Jonathan Wilkins, of The Baptist Tabernacle of Thomaston, gun rights advocate Edward Stone and the advocacy group GeorgiaCarry.Org. The lawsuit also lists Upson County as a defendant.

The suit asks the court to block the state from enforcing the ban.

A spokesman for Attorney General Thurbert Baker said the office had not reviewed the lawsuit and did not have any immediate comment. The Upson County attorney did not immediately return a phone call.

The lawsuit said Wilkins, who sometimes works alone at the church, "would like to carry a handgun while in the Tabernacle's place of worship for the protection of his flock, his family and himself."

The suit goes on to say the church would also like to be able to "have members armed for the protection of its members attending worship services and other events."

Monroe said he did not know of any previous crimes at the church, located about 65 miles south of Atlanta. But he said church officials have been concerned by church shootings in recent years, including a suburban Denver rampage that left four dead in 2007.

"The question ought to be why in the world would the state want to interfere with the administration of the church, and why in the world would anyone think crimes can't happen in the church?" Monroe said.