Michigan Students Sing Christian Songs After Legal Win
Schoolchildren at an elementary school in Michigan will be allowed to sing religious songs at an upcoming talent show after all. The legal organization First Liberty Institute intervened after school leaders previously said they couldn’t perform songs with Christian themes.
“It’s cruel that a school would threaten to censor elementary students from singing popular songs just because they are religious,” Kayla Toney, an attorney for First Liberty, said in a news release. “As the Supreme Court has repeatedly recognized, students do not lose their First Amendment rights when they walk through the schoolhouse gates. School officials need to comply with the law and stop censoring students’ religious expression.”
A teacher at West Ward Elementary School in Allegan, Michigan told the mother of a second-grader and fifth-grader that allowing her kids to sing songs by artists Brandon Lake and Colton Dixon would violate the separation of church and state. Principal Molly Carl said the second-grader’s song “That’s Who I Praise” was problematic because “there’s some very clear language about worshiping God” and it includes the word “slaves,” a clear reference to the biblical story of Moses leading the Jews out of Egypt to the Promised Land.”
First Liberty sent a letter to Carl and the teacher calling for the students to be allowed to sing their songs in an audition last week and in the talent show on May 23. Censoring the students’ song choices based on their Christian content would violate their religious-freedom rights, First Liberty said.
Staff members who had threatened to prohibit the performance of religious-themed songs “were unfamiliar with the legal guidelines concerning religious expression in a public school setting,” Superintendent Jame Antoine told “National Review.” “To clarify, students are permitted to perform songs of their choice, including those with religious content, provided the material complies with the student code of conduct — particularly regarding language and theme. Religious songs have been and will continue to be allowed at school events like talent shows.”
–Alan Goforth
