Jul 6, 2022:
In the name of religion, the Supreme Court has trashed religious liberty | The Hill
Jun 27, 2022:
By a vote of 6-3 (all three liberal justices dissenting) the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District allowing prayer on a high school football field.
Writing for the majority, Justice Neil Gorsuch said:
Respect for religious expressions is indispensable to life in a free and diverse Republic—whether those expressions take place in a sanctuary or on a field, and whether they manifest through the spoken word or a bowed head.
The only meaningful justification the government offered for its reprisal rested on a mistaken view that it had a duty to ferret out and suppress religious observances even as it allows comparable secular speech. The Constitution neither mandates nor tolerates that kind of discrimination.
Writing for the minority, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said:
It elevates one individual's interest in personal religious exercise, in the exact time and place of that individual's choosing, over society's interest in protecting the separation between church and state, eroding the protections for religious liberty for all.
Today's decision is particularly misguided because it elevates the religious rights of a school official, who voluntarily accepted public employment and the limits that public employment entails, over those of his students, who are required to attend school and who this Court has long recognized are particularly vulnerable and deserving of protection.
Source:
Kruzel, John. (June 27, 2022). "Supreme Court sides with high school coach who led prayer on football field". The Hill. Retrieved 2022-06-28
Read the entire 75-page decision here.
What the Supreme Court's football coach ruling means for schools and prayer | The Hill
Commentary:
Like the Supreme Court decision just three days ago overturning Roe v. Wade, this decision takes us backward in time and further erodes the concept of stare decisis.
This decision further blurs the line between church and state - a concept vital to our democracy as we know it.
Sotomayor's comments are "spot on" when she says that the coach "voluntarily accepted public employment and the limits that public employment entails", and that the decision elevates the coaches rights over those of his students/players.