Mississippi School Bans Graduation Prayer
(Do you know how hard search engines make it to find a picture of people praying at a graduation? This seems to be saying something in itself - DD)
Since 2019 the commencement exercises at Pearl High School in Mississippi have included the Pledge of Allegiance and a prayer.
The prayer was delivered by a student who typically started the invocation with a greeting to God and concluded with a hearty “Amen.”
But in 2025, there will not be a prayer.
The Mississippi school district announced they are banning what they called the “school-sponsored prayer.”
“The Board of Trustees of the Pearl Public School District has been advised of the concerns expressed in your letter dated September 11, 2024,” attorney Arthur F. Jernigan Jr. wrote in a letter to the atheists. “The district agrees that the alleged school-sponsored prayer at graduation will be eliminated.”
Their decision came after the Freedom From Religion Foundation filed a complaint. They allege that students have a constitutional right to be free from religious indoctrination in their taxpayer-funded schools.
“School districts exist to educate, not indoctrinate into religion,” chief atheist Annie Laurie Gaylor says. “Young, impressionable students…