The Supreme Court will soon decide if high school football coach Joe Kennedy should have lost his job for silently praying on the 50-yard line at the end of a game. The very fact that this case is in the high court exposes a deep misunderstanding of religious freedom and presents an opportunity to correct it.
You might think that the First Amendment, which prevents the government from violating one’s free exercise of religion, might have something to say about this. But according to the school, the free exercise of religion says nothing about losing your job because of your religious exercise. This confused thinking is the result of a confused interpretation of the law. The Supreme Court now has the chance to clear up that confusion in favor of religious liberty and common sense.
With a frayed “endorsement” theory, the school tried another at the Supreme Court: That the coach’s prayers were “coercive” to students. Coerced religious exercise is prohibited by the Constitution. But voluntary prayers are, by definition, not coercive. The school agrees that Kennedy’s prayers were voluntary and that no student was either encouraged or forced to participate in them. Instead, the school claimed that Kennedy’s prayers might “alienat[e] team members.