January 19, 2000
Political football: Republicans to vote
on allowing prayer at school games
___By Ken Camp
___Texas Baptist Communications
___A referendum on the Texas Republican Party primary ballot concerning prayer at school football games is "so nebulous as to be meaningless," said Phil Strickland, director of the Texas Baptist Christian Life Commission.
___The non-binding "Texas Religious Freedom Referendum" asks Republican primary voters: "Shall student-initiated prayer be allowed at school sporting events?"
___As stated on the March primary ballot, the referendum bears little resemblance to the real matter of a school district allowing students to use its public-address system to lead prayers at school-sponsored athletic events, Strickland maintained.
___The issue of football game prayers surfaced in a 1995 case involving the Santa Fe Independent School District, southeast of Houston. Two families--one Roman Catholic and the other Mormon--challenged the district's policy of permitting students to broadcast a prayer over a stadium's public-address system before the kickoff of each high school varsity home football game.
___The policy stated the invocation's purpose was "to solemnize the event, to promote good sportsmanship and student safety, and to establish the appropriate environment for the competition." The policy stipulated that the prayer was to be "non-sectarian" and "non-proselytizing."
___The U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the policy. Last November, the U.S. Supreme Court announced it would consider the case. A decision is expected this summer.
___Susan Weddington, chairman of the Republican Party of Texas, said the referendum offers Texans the opportunity "to express their collective outrage" at the decision by the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals regarding public prayers at school-sponsored sporting events.
___"We cannot allow an out-of-control, activist judiciary to sacrifice our freedoms at the altar of politically correct, modern-day liberalism," Weddington said.
___Strickland countered that students' freedom to pray voluntarily already is protected, but the real issue is government regulation of prayers' content.
___"If the referendum means what it says, it's already legal. Students can gather voluntarily before, during and after ballgames to pray. They have every opportunity to participate in genuine prayer," Strickland said. "Let's take advantage of the opportunities we have."
___But if the referendum's purpose is to generate support for the kind of school policy that the courts have rejected, voters should realize they are being asked to endorse "to whom it may concern" non-sectarian, non-proselytizing prayers, he explained.
___"I get a nervous twitch when government starts saying what kind of prayers can be voiced," Strickland said. "The fundamental point is that government ought to stay out of regulating prayer.
___"Government entanglement in religion is blatantly unconstitutional. It's hard to imagine getting more entangled than having the government check each prayer to see if it is 'non-sectarian' and 'non-proselytizing.'"
___Freedom to pray is too precious to be determined by majority vote on a state primary ballot, he continued.
___"If the right to prayer ever becomes a majority-rule issue, the whole notion of religious freedom has been annihilated," Strickland said.
___"The purpose of the First Amendment is to protect the freedom of everyone to pray and worship, whether that person is in the majority or the minority."
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