When the coach of a Tennessee high school girls soccer team directs players in group Christian prayer before each game, an atheist player named Pyper (her last name was not reported) never protests despite finding the religious rite offensive.

“I didn’t want to be benched or kicked off the team,” she explained to Heather L. Weaver, a staff attorney with the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union).

In part, that’s exactly why such directed prayer by tax-funded adult school officials is detrimental to atheist students and those of non-Christian faiths who are instantly branded as “others,” as marginalized outsiders, if they don’t participate, much less if they protest coerced religious indoctrination. It’s also unconstitutional — a violation of the First Amendment, which codifies religious freedom as well as official government non-involvement in it — and, thus, is illegal.

The ACLU and its Tennessee branch, on behalf of two self-described atheist families in Tennesee’s Smith County School System (SCSS), filed suit in late November against the SCSS Board of Education and top school officials for unconstitutionally ignoring required church-state separation requirements. The district is religiously diverse, with Christian, Muslim and atheist students.

Filed in U.S. District Court, Middle District of Tennessee, the suit alleges that the religious diversity of the district’s student population “matters little” to officials at the Smith County high school (which Pyper attends) and middle school.

“For years, [school officials] have routinely promoted and inculcated Christian religious beliefs by sponsoring religious activities and conveying religious messages to students at these two schools,” the lawsuit contends. “School-sponsored prayer is common at athletic and other school events; religious iconography and messages adorn the walls of the schools; and teacher proselytize their Christian faith. All these activities send a clear message to minority-faith and non-religious students that they are second-class members of the school community while their Christian peers are favored by school officials. Public schools belong to all and all belong to public schools. School officials’ blatant promotion of Christianity cannot be reconciled with this principle. Nor can school officials’ promotion of religion be reconciled with the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits public schools from imposing religious beliefs on their charges.”

Plaintiff Leyna Carr, one of the plaintiffs and a student at Smith County High School, said in a news release that Christian coercion is a fact of life at the school for nonbelievers, The Tennesseean newspaper reported.

“At school everybody makes it seem like you have to believe one thing, just like them,” Carr explained. “It’s very awkward and uncomfortable.”

Kelly Butler, another plaintiff in the case and the father of several children attending the county’s public schools, said the schools’ official promotion of Christianity is wrong, county CBS News affiliate WBIR Channel 10 reported.

“When I was in the military, I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution, which includes religious freedom,” Butler said in a press release, “It’s wrong for the public schools to make my family feel like second-class citizens because of our beliefs.”

In a news statement released after the suit was filed, ACLU explained further its rationale in trying to make the school system accountable to the Constitution:

“The unlawful activities reported by the [plaintiff] families span several school years and include, among other practices, school-directed prayer during mandatory assemblies; the distribution and display of Bibles during classes; Bible verses posted in hallways and shared in notes from school staff to students; prayers broadcast through loudspeakers at school sporting events; coaches leading or participating in prayer with student athletes; and a large cross painted on the wall of a school athletic facility.”

Hedy Weinberg, ACLU-Tennessee (ACLU-TN) executive director, said students shouldn’t be indoctrinated in religion at school.

“The religious freedom of Tennessee families can only be protected if the government is not promoting or sponsoring religious activities,” she wrote in the news release. “Decisions about whether and how to practice religion are best left to families and faith communities, not public schools.”

The plaintiffs are also seeking a preliminary injunction to put an immediate end to the unconstitutional practices identified in the complaint.

Harleigh (only her first name was reported), a student at Smith County High School, explained what the school’s Christianized atmosphere feels like to non-Christians:

“Overall, it’s really uncomfortable. You feel like you don’t fit in at all.”

And as anyone who has ever been an adolescent knows, virtually nothing is more important at that age than “fitting in,” not feeling like a loser outcast.

This is important, beside the fact that SCSS’s years-long, Christianity-promoting practices, however traditional they may be considered by locals, are illegal under the Constitution.

Image/Wikimedia Commons

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