A high school football coach in Washington state who won his job back after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled he could pray on the field resigned Wednesday after just one game back.
Assistant Bremerton High School coach Joe Kennedy made the announcement on his website, citing several reasons, including that he needed to care for an ailing family member out of state. He had been living full-time in Florida, and before the first game last Friday he said he didn’t know if he’d continue coaching.
“I believe I can best continue to advocate for constitutional freedom and religious liberty by working from outside the school system so that is what I will do,” Kennedy wrote. “I will continue to work to help people understand and embrace the historic ruling at the heart of our case.”
He is free to do as he wants, just like everyone else. If he wants to pray, he can pray.
What he is not free to do is require (or pressure) players on his team to take part in the prayer, or make it seem as though it is an officially endorsed action by the public school system. But he absolutely has the freedom to pray whenever he wants for whatever he wants.
Prayer happens in the mind. Assuming he wasn’t making anyone recite stuff out loud, at best people would just stand their for a minute while he does his pre-game ritual or whatever. My family prayed before every meal when I was growing up. I just sat there and waited until they were done. I didn’t actively participate by praying, but I also wasn’t a dick about it.
People pray out loud all the time…
It sounds like you aren’t familiar with any prior articles related to this coach.
C’mon, since when is even cursory knowledge required to comment on the subject? /s
For real. All it does is get in the way of me running my mouth.
Should I apologize for not knowing the details of something that happened to a random football coach in 2015?
I mean, the article that this post is linked to discusses it, and has a link to more information. So, in this case, yes?
It wasn’t like that, he was forcing players to pray, they didn’t have to option to object or they would be kicked off the team.
Based on the information from the court case, they didn’t find evidence of that
But it was asserted there was social pressure to do so.
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/21-418_i425.pdf
Have a source for that assertion?