No penalty for prayer

A federal appeals court last week overturned a 2017 lower court decision that barred two Christian high schools in Florida from using a stadium’s public-address system for a pregame prayer.

A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Cambridge Christian School in Tampa should have another chance to argue in court that the Florida High School Athletics Association (FHSAA) violated its First Amendment rights to free speech and the free exercise of religion.

“You’ve got two Christian schools playing each other, both with the same tradition in football, and yet they weren’t allowed to use the state-controlled microphones in order to do this prayer over the loudspeaker,” said First Liberty counsel Jeremy Dys, who represents Cambridge Christian. “These are the same microphones that Billy Graham once used two or three times to hold crusades in that very same stadium.”

In December 2015, Cambridge Christian and Jacksonville’s University Christian School played in the state’s Class 2A championship game, which was supervised and regulated by the FHSAA and held at Camping World Stadium in Orlando. The two schools asked the association for permission to use the stadium’s PA system to say a joint pregame prayer, a longstanding tradition. The FHSAA denied the request, saying it would violate the separation of church and state because the game was taking place at a public facility. The stadium is owned and operated by the city of Orlando and is home to college football’s Citrus Bowl.

“The fact that the facility is a public facility, predominantly paid for with public tax dollars, makes the facility ‘off-limits’ under federal guidelines,” wrote Roger Dearing, who was the executive director of the FHSAA in 2015.

U.S. Circuit Judge Stanley Marcus wrote in the 11th Circuit ruling that the FHSAA allowed prayers at least four times previously, which suggested the association didn’t think prayer conflicted with the purpose of the event. Marcus also found the FHSAA’s policy gave schools considerable leeway when it came to other messages presented to attendees, such as halftime shows. He concluded that a loudspeaker prayer did not necessarily communicate a state endorsement of religion.

“I’m thrilled that we’re still in the game,” said Shawn Minks, Cambridge Christian’s head of school. “Prayer is a core part of who we are as a school, to our students and to our teams. We hope the courts will continue to protect our right to pray over the loudspeaker before kickoff—especially at a game between two Christian schools that share the value of prayer.”

The school had “a longstanding practice and tradition that is unmistakably and closely tied to basic religious beliefs,” Marcus wrote. He said the FHSAA prohibition overly burdened the free exercise of religion.

Dys has defended other schools whose pregame prayers came under attack. The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) complained about the practice in Valdosta, Ga., and First Liberty sent a letter to the Lowndes County School District advising it could constitutionally permit pregame prayer by adopting a policy that allowed a student to make remarks over a stadium PA system without any restriction on content—whether a fight song, prayer, or some other comment—provided it wasn’t violent or obscene. The school district adopted such a policy in September.

And in Cameron, Mo., last week, the FFRF took aim at a postgame prayer at the 50-yard line led by Cameron High School head coach Jeff Wallace and assistant coach David Stucky. Dys told Fox News that the FFRF’s letter to the school district was “little more than a noisy, public complaint meant to harass and embarrass Americans just trying to live their lives.”