WE WON A VICTORY TODAY FOR THE FIRST AMENDMENT!
Recently the Wisconsin group, Freedom From Religion Foundation, sent a letter to the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors threatening a lawsuit over the practice of allowing prayer before meetings. FFRF has sent similar letters to municipalities all over the country in a effort to scare them into removing prayer, God, the ten commandments and religion in general. Giles County, also in SW Virginia, has been dealing with a FFRF lawsuit over the posting of the ten commandments in their High School.
Today, the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors planned to vote on a new rule designed to please the FFRF and prevent the threat of a lawsuit from becoming a reality. The rule would have prevented ministers delivering the pre-meeting invocation from mentioning the Bible, Jesus or anything else that might be specific to a particular religion.
We at STAND know this to be a violation of the first amendment and were on hand to speak in opposition to it. I am excited to be able to announce we won the day! After realizing we all knew their proposed rule was a violation of the first amendment, they did not vote to approve it. Here is the statement from Bishop Jackson I delivered on behalf of STAND:
