A California school district is fighting a legal battle to defend opening prayer, arguing it’s perfectly permissible to open meetings by invoking God.
Joel Oster, an attorney for Advocates For Faith & Freedom, told CBN News Chino Valley Unified School District has taken decisive legal action to challenge what it believes to be an outdated injunction from the Ninth Circuit Court preventing the school board from opening with prayer.
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According to a press release, Oster and his team have “filed a motion to lift the injunction, seeking to establish a policy that permits invocations prior to school board meetings in accordance with long-standing American traditions.”
Oster explained the background of the case.
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“About 10 years ago, a lawsuit was filed against Chino Valley claiming that their practice of opening up a school board meeting with prayer violated the Establishment Clause, and the Ninth Circuit agreed and entered an injunction, and they based that injunction on what is called the Lemon Test,” he said, noting that the so-called Lemon Test is no longer in effect after football coach Joe Kennedy successfully won a battle to pray on the 50-yard line.
He continued, “The Supreme Court has now overturned the Lemon Test and said it’s not good law. It doesn’t respect how the Establishment Clause should be enforced [and] should be interpreted.”
Based on Kennedy’s Supreme Court win in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, Oster said Chino Valley is now going to the courts and pushing back on the injunction against prayer, arguing it should be “cast aside” in light of the Lemon Test being tossed.
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The attorney explained why he believes it’s perfectly permissible to begin school board meetings with prayer, noting it all comes down to history and legality.
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