On April 25, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case, Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, about a public school football coach who pressured his players to pray with him at the 50-yard line. The court’s conservative majority seemed to signal support for the coach.
It’s an important case for a nation where religious freedom and the separation of church and state are being put into question. But this case is also of personal significance to my family. You see, something quite similar happened to my daughter years ago. I share her story so that other people can see for themselves why it’s wrong to impose religion on children in public schools — and in the hope that the court does the right thing and protects students’ religious freedom.
In 2005, when my daughter Amanda was in high school in California, she was on the junior varsity soccer team at our local public school. One night, she came home from a game and told my wife and me that her coach had prayed with the team. We learned that the coach had been saying Christian prayers before every game.
