{"id":9322,"date":"2011-11-04T19:40:19","date_gmt":"2011-11-04T23:40:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/?p=9322"},"modified":"2011-11-04T22:28:05","modified_gmt":"2011-11-05T02:28:05","slug":"after-12-years-of-praying-for-kids-at-flagpole-pastor-says-offended-atheists-wont-stop-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2011\/11\/after-12-years-of-praying-for-kids-at-flagpole-pastor-says-offended-atheists-wont-stop-him","title":{"rendered":"After 12 years of praying with kids at flagpole, pastor says offended atheists won’t stop him"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Can a Wisconsin atheist group keep a Florida preacher from meeting with local kids who want to pray at their school\u2019s flagpole before classes begin?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Students praying in Fort Myers, Florida<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

School Attorney Bruce Bickner for the Clay County School Board says the atheists can, indeed \u2013 that their threat of an expensive lawsuit means the kids need to stop praying. It seems the Madison, Wisc.-based Freedom from Religion Foundation is offended that for more than 12 years, Pastor Ron Baker of the nearby Russell Baptist Church, has showed up once a week at four different local elementary schools and prayed with any kids who want to start the day asking for the help, guidance and protection of the Almighty.<\/p><\/div>\n

School Attorney Bickner says the school district must bow to the demands of the out-of-town atheists. He says, regardless of how anybody in Clay County, Florida, feels, praying at the flagpole is against the law, because \u201cit is a violation of the United States Constitution for a teacher, school administrator or other school district employee to join in a prayer session during their work time,\u201d according to the Jacksonville daily newspaper the Florida Times-Union.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Pastor Ron Baker<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But a Christian legal group, the American Center for Law and Justice, points out that neither the preacher or the kids are school district employees. The ACLJ says the school district attorney has no authority over the parson or the children who want to pray with him \u2013 even if it offends Wisconsin atheists.<\/p>\n

And ever since the atheist group\u2019s threats were revealed to the public, the crowd of kids has grown.<\/p>\n

Baker, a low-key country pastor, says he just wants to continue what he\u2019s done for years without fanfare \u2013 praying with children whose prayer requests range from sick grandmothers to scraped knees and lost hamsters.<\/p>\n

\u201cDid you ever think that in America you\u2019d be in trouble for praying at the flag?\u201d Pastor Baker asked reporters. \u201cIt\u2019s disturbing.\u201d<\/p>\n

For years, the parson and kids have prayed at 8:15 or so once a week outside each of the four elementary schools.<\/p>\n

At Clay Hill Elementary, Principal Larry Davis suggested that Baker move the prayer time back an hour to 7:10.<\/p>\n

Baker says he only prays with kids briefly. Asking first graders to show up for school more than an hour early is unreasonable, he says. Six-year-olds can\u2019t pray for an hour \u2013 their attention spans are barely five minutes.<\/p>\n

Parent Debbie Kent, whose two children have attended Baker\u2019s prayer time voluntarily says she thinks that \u201cit\u2019s important for the children\u201d that the parson be allowed to continue \u2013 \u201cto remind them that they need to stand up for what we believe in. This is a good way to show it.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked by a reporter if she thought children were being forced to pray, Kent pointed out that it was her kids\u2019 idea to go pray with the preacher.<\/p>\n

Pastor Baker says he plans to continue praying at Clay Hill Elementary. He\u00a0also prays with kids once a week at Bennett, Lake Asbury and Shadowlawn Elementary Schools.\u00a0\u201cI\u2019ve been advised by the American Center for Law and Justice that there is nothing illegal about what we\u2019re doing and that it falls well within the perimeters of what the constitution allows,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Superintendent of Schools Ben Wortham says he will not ask police to arrest anybody.\u00a0\u201cMy goal is to find some common ground rather than end up in an expensive lawsuit and a battleground,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Wortham is meeting with the School Board on Nov. 14. The school prayers will be the only item on the workshop agenda.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoes the school board\u2019s statement makes sense?\u201d asks the news site Hot Air.<\/a> \u201cWhere exactly does it say in the Constitution that government employees aren\u2019t allowed to join a prayer session?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt actually says, \u2018Congress should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIn general, the courts have held that the free exercise clause covers religiously motivated actions and not just internal belief, so wouldn\u2019t a prayer session count as \u2018the free exercise\u2019 of religion?<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd how is \u2018prayer session\u2019 even defined? Does it extend to personal prayers, prayed soundlessly in the stress of a school day? It\u2019s unconstitutional for the government to force employees to pray \u2013 but the Constitution certainly doesn\u2019t forbid them from doing so.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnless Baker is a school district employee \u2013 and he doesn\u2019t appear to be — what jurisdiction does the school board have over his actions at all?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Can a Wisconsin atheist group keep a Florida preacher from meeting with local kids who want to pray at their school\u2019s flagpole before classes begin? 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