This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
You just can't stereotype California. In a state known derogatorily as the land of "fruits and nuts," where anti-Christian agendas are common, where faith often is considered a defect, one school district has gone into court to restore opening prayer to its board meetings.
Joel Oster, of Advocates For Faith & Freedom, said in an interview with CBN that the dispute centers around the Chino Valley Unified School District.
It believes an injunction from the 9th U.S. Court of Appeals barring those invocations is wrong.
And the ban should be removed, the case argues.
"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," the lawyer explained in the report.
However, that "Lemon test" standard later was abandoned, in the Joe Kennedy case, by the Supreme Court.
"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," Oster explained.
That provides the foundation for the Chino Valley's argument that the 9th Circuit's old decision was wrongfully decided, and it should be thrown out.
The CBN report explained why he believes it's permissible to begin school board meetings with prayer, noting it all comes down to history and legality.
"Prayer before school board meetings … is something that has been going on in our nation's history since before the Constitution was even drafted," he said. "And prayer has … been used to start deliberative bodies for centuries. There's been a congressional prayer …for as long as there's been a Congress."
And, he noted, it's just wrong to tell religious people they're "not welcome."
"Whenever you do open up a deliberative session with a prayer, it just helps to bring solemnity," Oster said in the CBN report. "It helps to bring wisdom to an event, helps to focus people on the task at hand, and, so, for that reason, the Supreme Court has said that prayers are allowed, they are constitutional to open up deliberative body sessions."
He said he believes Chino Valley will succeed, and courts will see that opening prayers are not a constitutional violation.
