This commissioner, a woman, wants to be her real religious self when she prays. If someone forces her to pray a neutral prayer, then that is both violating her free exercise AND establishing a government preferred religion.
What is awesome is that Kennedy and the court appear to agree with that. It's awesome because it is exactly true.
In Kennedy's own words:
"Government is prohibited from prescribing prayers ... In order to promote a preferred system of belief or code of moral behavior," Kennedy wrote."It would be a few steps removed from that prohibition for legislatures to require chaplains to redact the religious content from their message in order to make it acceptable for the public sphere," he continued.
As much as I respect Jordan Sekulow, he is in error in his comments at the end of this article, in my non-lawyer opinion.
(Monica Miller, a lawyer with American Humanist Association) "In this case if the county decided to completely change its practice and do something exactly like the town of Greece perhaps that would be okay," she added.Jordan Sekulow, with the American Center for Law and Justice, disagreed. "This idea that we're going to have prayer, but it can't be sectarian prayer is now out the door," Sekulow told CBN News...."What the court said today is if you're going to have prayer, and there's a Christian praying, they can absolutely close their prayer in Jesus' name," ...
Anthony Kennedy, in his opinion, specifically cited the fact that the town Greece, NY, used all the congregations in their phone book as a list for randomly/systematically selecting the person to pray.
In other words, the court approved of prayer at council meetings so long as the practice was open to and tolerant of everyone on the basis of their representation in the area as determined by their presence in the phone book.
Most important to me, though, is that Scotus said they don't want to be 'religion police'. They voted in favor of free exercise yesterday so long as everyone gets tolerated and the opportunity is presented based on their representation in the population.
Will that mean that at some point in time I'll have to sit through an Imam's prayer BASED ON his representation in my local population? Yes. But, these things are important to me:
1. I don't have to AMEN to his prayer to his foreign god.
2. I'll get some cross cultural training.
3. In our Christian area, I'll get a lot of prayers from a lot of different denominations...some of which will also be cross cultural training, and a few of which, I'll not be able to AMEN.
“Two-hundred and forty years later, however, America is much more religiously diverse”
Apparently the constitution is now invalid because of diversity.
As a matter of courtesy and respect for others, I would have no problem sitting thru a prayer offered by a Buddhist monk or a Jew. I’d have more problems with a Muslim, but again - as a matter of courtesy and respect for others - I’d sit through it without complaint. I don’t believe Mormons are Christians, but I lived in Utah for years and was never offended when Mormons prayed around me.
While an RN, my wife would sometimes ask an ill patient if it was OK for her to pray for him or her, and no one ever said no. Most people understand respect for others religious beliefs. Only a small handful attack Christians who pray...
You have informed insight to this issue, dear brother in Christ, thank you for sharing!