Dude, no one was fired for praying. He was fired for leading children under his charge in prayer. No one here is suggesting people can’t pray, so please stop with that straw man. People are saying teachers/coaches should not indoctrinate kids under their charge with their particular religion.
Would you honestly believe someone should be free to teach kids satanic rituals post game as part of celebrating their religion?
Jesus even issued warnings about people that only want to engage in conspicous prayer ““And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”
“Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven”
These directions are dismissed by most Evangelicals. Most don’t believe in love thy neighbor either.
Yep. My parents would have said he isn’t praying. He can pray sitting quietly on the bench. He is making a show of his religiosity for humans, not talking to God.
It is always about a spectacle with these religious hypocrites.
They through themselves onto a cross and then cry about their persecution.
With the prayer one, instead of facing inward like this, imagine them all facing Mecca.
What would the audience do? What would the players do? What would the parents do when their kids inevitably start joining in? What would the school do when the parents freak out? What would the SCOTUS do?
Maybe it would pass. Maybe not. Maybe the guy would get lynched before it hit the court system.
(That’s not to imply I know the answer. There’s a legit argument that a Muslim coach should be able to get on the 50 yard line and students should be able to join him. But it’s not obvious imo.)
He was not fired for praying. Nobody should ever be fired for praying to any being they want. He got fired for leading an organized prayer session in his role as an agent for the state. This is a clear violation of the establishment clause. In defending this decision, the justices had to jump through some pretty insane hoops.
Likewise, this argument ignores the
District Court’s conclusion (and the District’s concession)
that Mr. Kennedy’s actual job description left time for a private moment after the game to call home, check a text, socialize, or engage in any manner of secular activities. Others working for the District were free to engage briefly in
personal speech and activity. App. 205; see Part I–B, supra.
That Mr. Kennedy chose to use the same time to pray does
not transform his speech into government speech.
So basically they are saying that if there is any point in a government employee’s work day when they can engage in a personal activity (like texting) they could instead lead a prayer. This is an absurd standard. I hope we can all see that.
I’m not sure if I could disagree more with the SCOTUS decision. Religious liberty and religious freedom are critically important tenants of our Constitution. Forcing states to direct public funding to religious organizations seems like a cut and dry violation of the establishment clause.
Nope. The whole point of the Maine voucher program is to deal with the fact that the state is highly rural, and many districts don’t even have a high school. To solve this problem, the state created a voucher program that allowed parents to choose which school to send their children to. The state didn’t want public tax money being funneled to religious institutions, so the voucher program required the school to be non-religious.
In comes the SCOTUS and tells Maine that they do not have the right to create a voucher program that excludes religious schools. (This is a clear reduction in power to state legislatures. So we can’t say that the court is motivated by that goal.)
In my view, once a school is being funded by taxpayer money, it becomes a public school in my eyes. I don’t think we should have public schools teaching religion. To me, that is a clear violation of the establishment clause. I have long since lost that battle. SCOTUS has held that voucher programs that funnel tax money to churches are legal as long as they don’t favor one religion over another. This decision takes that a step further and FORCES a state to funnel money to churches if they have a voucher system in place.
I don’t think the state should be able to prevent a parent from sending their children to a non-public school. The problem is when citizens are forced to have their tax money sent to religious indoctrination centers. This isn’t an issue of parent’s choice. This is an issue of publically funding churches.
Nobody is claiming this.
Note that Mr Kennedy claims he did not ask the players to be near him when he “prayed in private” in the middle of the field or on the sideline or somewhere that he could be seen by the whole team.
But most of the players understood the implication and the peer pressure.
He could also do this in his office in private, away from everyone, after the game and all the post-game stuff. IMO, the reason for his choice was obvious.
I agree. 100%.
Beer time!
(Checks watch)… hmm, it’s noon somewhere and a local brewery is open.
He was indoctrinating the students
Maybe you 2 need to read the details of the case. My understanding is there was no leading going on in this case at all.
I think you are believing the propaganda that showboat has been selling for years.
The case before the court was specifically: Does a personal religious act (praying) that can be seen by others violate the establishment clause?
The facts of the case pretty clearly state that he wasn’t actively leading a prayer or actively encouraging anyone to pray with him.
From the SCOTUS opinion:
In an October 28 Q&A document provided to the public,
the District admitted that it possessed “no evidence that
students have been directly coerced to pray with Kennedy.”
Id., at 105. The Q&A also acknowledged that Mr. Kennedy
“ha[d] complied” with the District’s instruction to refrain
from his “prior practices of leading players in a pre-game
prayer in the locker room or leading players in a post-game
prayer immediately following games.”
So if a teacher gets up in front of their classroom and starts praying out loud, would you somehow claim that the teacher isn’t leading the classroom in a prayer? This takes extreme mental gymnastics.
If during my next 1-1 with one of my subordinates, I end the call with a prayer, would you find that appropriate even if I never told her she needed to participate. In fact, I didn’t say anything about the prayer.
Your quote states that no one was directly (very important word in this context) coerced to pray with him. It does not say he wasn’t leading a prayer. Tell me, does this look like praying silently to himself or leading a prayer?
The facts are that he was actively leading a prayer. You can’t deny that. It’s a basic fact of the case. Just look at the picture a couple posts up be SredniVashtar. That’s a clear-cut image of the coach leading the team in prayer.
He didn’t force students to participate, but the power dynamics in play make it impossible for the coach not to be applying pressure to the students. I can’t imagine how somebody couldn’t see that.
Also from the SCOTUS opinion:
The record reveals that Kennedy had a longstanding practice of conducting demonstrative prayers on the 50-yard line of the football field. Kennedy consistently invited others to join his prayers and for years led student athletes in prayer at the same time and location. The Court ignores this history. The Court also ignores the severe disruption to school events caused by Kennedy’s conduct, viewing it as irrelevant because the Bremerton School District (District) stated that it was suspending Kennedy to avoid it being viewed as endorsing religion. Under the Court’s analysis, presumably this would be a different case if the District had cited Kennedy’s repeated disruptions of school programming and violations of school policy regarding public access to the field as grounds for suspending him. As the District did not articulate those grounds, the Court assesses only the District’s Establishment Clause concerns. It errs by assessing them divorced from the context and history of Kennedy’s prayer practice.
@Nick_Papagiorgio Maybe you should read the details of the case. This is called leading players in prayer, and is part of the dissent as posted by Kenny above
On October 16, after playing of the game had concluded, Kennedy shook hands with the opposing team, and as advertised, knelt to pray while most BHS players were singing the school’s fight song. He quickly was joined by coaches and players from the opposing team. Television news cameras surrounded the group.2 Members of the public rushed the field to join Kennedy, jumping fences to access the field and knocking over student band members. After the game, the District received calls from Satanists who “‘intended to conduct ceremonies on the field after football games if others were allowed to.’”
…and I was singing, bye bye miss american pie.
That won’t be allowed. Only performative prayers offered in the name of the one true religion, Evangelical Christianity, are permissible.
