Council votes to keep prayer & pledge intact at council meetingACLU out trolling for lawsuits at senior citizen centers now. How much lower can these people sink? What is next? Hospices? Banning chapels from Hospitals? Will they chisel crosses off monuments in public cemeteries?Dorine Goss
Chino Valley ReviewAn estimated 50 to 60 Chino Valley residents showing their support for public prayer greeted council members and staff at last week’s town council meeting.
Men, women and children lined the entrance to town hall and positioned themselves along the drive on Road 1 West. They carried hand-drawn placards that said, “Let them pray,” “The Majority has a voice,” “ACLU go home,” and “Pray good things happen.”
Some were the same residents who have been showing their support for public prayer by picketing at the Chino Valley Senior Center since early last week.
In late July Chino Valley resident Doris Thompson complained to town officials that she objected to the senior center prayer, either spoken or silent, and to having to stand for the noon prayer. She quoted a portion of a letter that she received from the Arizona Civil Liberties Union that said it is likely that the prayer at the center violates the Supreme Court Rulings regarding First Amendment rights of individuals.
So the town asked seniors not to pray, but to pause for a moment of silence.
Florence Sloan, chairman of the Advisory Board for the Senior Center, said most of the seniors who eat lunch at the center would like to “see the prayer right where it is, just as it is.” She said seniors were “devastated” at the news and many had tears in their eyes . . .