A three judge panel of the uber-liberal 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled against a Washington State high school football coach who prayed during football games. High School football Coach Joe Kennedy, who was as an assistant coach at Bremerton High School from 2008-2015, was suspended as a coach in 2015 after the Bermerton School District decided that he had no rights to constitutionally protected free-speech. Coach Kennedy appealed his suspension for praying with his team, only to have the U.S. 9^th Circuit Court, which was made even more liberal by Barack Obama, order him and, by extension, other high school coaches not to bow their heads, take a knee, or do anything resembling the act of public prayer. We are truly living in an America “fundamentally transformed” by secular-progressivism.

Patriotic Americans must stand-up to this cultural Marxism that makes it acceptable, even laudable, for an NFL quarterback to take a knee to disrespect this nation’s banner, but not okay for a high school football coach to bow his head with his ball players. The 9^th Circuit Court codified this looney logic in a painfully convoluted opinion that stated “When Kennedy kneeled and prayed on the 50-yard line immediately after games while in view of students and parents, he spoke as a public employee, not as a private citizen, and his speech therefore was constitutionally unprotected.” There in the dried ink of a federal court opinion is the death kneel of religious liberty for public employees. Liberals have so secularized the public arena that even the act of participation in voluntary prayer makes a school employee the enemy of the state.

A public employee does not surrender his or her First Amendment rights at the door of their workplace; they are protected by the same constitutional provisions as any other citizen of the Great Republic. If Coach Kennedy had forced his football players to participate in a sectarian prayer, under threat of punishment if they did not, that would clearly be unconstitutional and unethical. Neither was the case with this caring coach; he merely participated in student-led prayers and bowed his head in thanks at the conclusion of each game. I think that parents in Washington, like parents everywhere, have more to fear from transgender bathroom policies in public schools than a praying coach.

The American people are sick and tired of having our values trampled by a few black-robed tyrants who believe that their role as a judge is to participate in a rewrite of the Constitution. This latest ruling by the 9^th Circuit Court is an act of judicial tyranny, pure and simple, which violates the First Amendment to the very Constitution these judges have sworn to protect. In the face of such blatant disregard for the Constitution, and the rights it guarantees, I agree with Rev. Franklin Graham’s nationwide call to civil disobedience. Graham told reporters “I think it would be great if football coaches across the country went out on the field wherever they are and prayed. And those there to watch the game stand in prayer with them. Let’s show our support for Coach Kennedy, a former Marine who didn’t back down on prayer.”

Amen Reverend Graham.