ICLU Gets Prayer Cut from Indiana Public School Graduation
by Jim Brown
May 25, 2004
(AgapePress) - A lawsuit threat from the Indiana Civil Liberties Union has prompted a high school in the Indianapolis area to drop its tradition of prayer at graduation.After receiving a complaint from one student who did not want an invocation at this year's graduation ceremony, officials at Avon High School decided there would be no public prayer at the program. The decision came under advice from the district's legal counsel and pressure from the ICLU, which is assisting the 18-year-old student.
Longtime school board member Lloyd Acton, a professing Christian, says he is in a difficult position in this matter because school leaders cannot authorize a school-led prayer. "My hands are somewhat tied," he says, "because you're interviewing me as a school board member and not as a citizen. I have a hard time separating out the two, but I have to."
However, the ICLU has said it will not sue if student-led prayers occur at the commencement ceremony. Acton says if graduation ceremony prayers were to be initiated by the students, he would "say a hardy 'Amen.'" Of course, he says, "I may say it under my breath, not loudly or into the microphone, but I would certainly say that was a good thing."
And the school board member says if the American Civil Liberties Union should sue over student-initiated prayer, he would be willing to fight the lawsuit.
"It would be my hope and desire that they would never in any way thwart the opportunity for our students to have a prayer if they were to choose to," Acton says. "I would certainly be one of the forerunners of considering to make that stand if the students were driving a prayer."
A prayer rally, organized by the father an Avon High School senior, is being held at the school administration building Tuesday evening, just three days before graduation. Another student, Megan Gainey, 16, was quoted by Associated Press as saying that most of the graduating seniors want prayer included in the commencement ceremony.
According to education guidelines released last year, U.S. schools could lose federal funding if they choose to bar students from praying at graduation.
