According to those in the Evangelical movement, the relentless assault on freedom of religion won a great victory in Texas. You can read their side of this story here (but similar hyperbole is all over the blogosphere):
Whom will you obey?
(The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has since overturned the District Court ruling and the ceremony went on as planned, but the issue is not dead).
A friend sent me a link to the FRC's rant and this is my response to him:
As usual, Tony Perkins isn't telling the whole story, which I find particularly reprehensible coming from someone who claims to be a pastor. A lie by omission is still a lie. One must wonder which is more important to Perkins: Upholding God's standards of truthfullness or his political agenda.
The Federal District Court for the Western District of Texas did, indeed, issue an injunction ordering the Medina Valley Independent School District from making prayer a part of their graduation ceremony....OFFICIAL PRAYER and OFFICIAL PRAYER ONLY! There is not now, nor has there ever been, a prohibition on student led prayers at any school function and there isn't now in this case. What IS prohibited by the Constitution, and upheld through dozens of court cases, is prayer which has the school's stamp of official approval.
This is nothing new and not something Christian's should be afraid of. In fact, believers ought to WELCOME such rulings because it prohibits OUR kids from having to sit through an official, school-sponsored prayer to Allah or Gaia, the earth goddess, or some other "diety" we don't believe in. What the purveyors of religious hatred and prejudice, like Perkins, always fail to point out is that if WE can do it, so can anyone else. It's far better for all of us if we don't force our beliefs into the school system because, by doing do, we force everyone elses in there too.
In this case, the Judge placed only the following restrictions on student led prayer during the ceremony:
(b) The District, through its officials, shall instruct the students previously selected todeliver the “invocation” and “benediction” to modify their remarks to be statements oftheir own beliefs as opposed to leading the audience in prayer. These students, and allother persons scheduled to speak during the graduation ceremony, shall be instructed not
to present a prayer, to wit, they shall be instructed that they may not ask audiencemembers to “stand,” “join in prayer,” or “bow their heads,” they may not end theirremarks with “amen” or “in [a deity’s name] we pray,” and they shall not otherwisedeliver a message that would commonly be understood to be a prayer, nor use the word“prayer” unless it is used in the student’s expression of the student’s personal belief, as
opposed to encouraging others who may not believe in the concept of prayer to join inand believe the same concept. The students may in stating their own personal beliefsspeak through conduct such as kneeling to face Mecca, the wearing of a yarmulke or hijab or making the sign of the cross.
As you can see by this part of the actual ruling, a student may lead what he/she calls a prayer and do anything they like in a physical manner, such as kneel, make the sign of the Cross or whatever, so long as they clearly identify what they're doing is a part of their own, personal beliefs, but they may not ask everyone else to join in. That is a key distinction which has great Constitutional importance. Prayer is not banned from school functions as the students themselves hold rights guaranteed by the Constitution which they are free to exercise, but requiring, forcing or asking others to join in makes that prayer an official part of the ceremony and lends to it the stamp of approval from the school district, which is clearly un-Constitutional.
In this case, though, a plea for relief was sought at the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans and the plaintiffs won that round. The District Court judge's injunction was overturned and the graduation ceremony went on as planned. I can't find the Circuit Court's ruling, so I can't say what justification they used for overturning it, but I suspect it was because of the restrictions placed upon student-led prayer, which probably went to far. I can just about assure you, though, that it was not overturned because the Circuit Court believes there is case law which supports the notion of official prayer at school functions. I'll keep looking and report back when I find it.
One thing is certain: The case will probably make its way to the Supreme Court, depending upon WHY the Circuit Court over-ruled the District Judge.
Something instructive happened during the ceremony, which should not go unnoticed: Christian activist's planned to bus several thousand supporters to the ceremony from all over Texas. Since this whole process, from original filing to the Circuit Court ruling, took only a matter of a few days and, in fact, the time frame between the Circuit Court ruling and the actual ceremony was measured in hours, how did they organize such a mass movement of people so quickly? And, who paid for it? (Since the Circuit Court ruling, that caravan of supporters may not have gone off.)
The answer is clear: Those people already had contingency plans in place, just waiting for an opportunity to act. It was pre-planned, organized and coordinated long before the original case was filed. All they needed was a case to put their plan into action. In other words, nobody in this whole movement gives much of a damn about the kids in Castroville because it could have as easily been any other school district. What they DO care about is making a political statement and it matters not to them what the Constitutional point is or what it does to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Everything else is secondary to the politics of the issue and that's a big part of what's wrong with the Church today.
Frankly, it wouldn't suprise me one bit to learn that the "atheist's" who filed the original complaint are not "secret" Christian's after all who filed the plea for an injuction just to make a court case they could act upon. It's been done before and the term used is "test case." Make a bogus filing just to get a ruling, then put the public demonstration plan into effect.
If anyone wonders why modern-day Christianity has no power, look no futher than our putting partisan politics ahead of Jesus Christ.