Concord, IN -- Liberty Counsel offered to represent the Concord Community School District free of charge, after the Freedom From Religion Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union sued the school this week to end its 30-year-old Christmas Spectacular.

“Contrary to the allegations in the lawsuit, it is constitutional for a Christmas performance to include a live nativity along with Christmas carols, so long as there are sufficient secular elements and songs in the performance,” said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel. “Concord’s Christmas Spectacular is a joyful mix of the Season’s secular and religious narratives,” Staver pointed out.

The 2014 Christmas Spectacular included the following songs: “Joy to the World,” “Here Comes Santa Claus,” “Last Christmas,” “Christmas Time is Here,” a medley of “Walking in a Winter Wonderland,” “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” and “Let It Snow.” The ninety-nine minute performance consisted of numerous secular elements, including three large light-up Christmas trees, students dressed as elves, Santa Clauses, and Nutcracker toy soldiers. The Christmas Spectacular concluded with students performing a twenty-minute, narrated, live Nativity Scene, with the Biblical Christmas story and traditional Christmas carols, such as “Christ in the Manger,” “Silent Night,” and “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.”

“This program is perfectly constitutional,” Staver advised. “FFRF and ACLU are hostile to religion. Every year the cold winds of secularism blow in trying to extinguish the joys of Christmas. Again this year, Liberty Counsel is defending public organizations against the secularists’ bullying and threats,” Staver said.

When ruling on a publicly sponsored Christmas display, the U.S. Supreme Court said, “To forbid the use of this one passive symbol - the crèche - at the very time people are taking note of the season with Christmas hymns and carols in public schools and other public places, and while the Congress and Legislatures open sessions with prayer by paid chaplains, would be a stilted over-reaction contrary to our history and to our holdings.”

The High Court has also rejected the argument that singing Christian carols would entangle the school with religion. “Music without sacred music, architecture minus the Cathedral, or painting without the Scriptural themes would be eccentric and incomplete, even from a secular point of view.”

“If that is the case for music, architecture, or paintings, then surely a ‘Christmas Spectacular’ without the Christ of Christmas ‘would be eccentric and incomplete, even from a secular point of view’ as well,” concluded Staver.

Liberty Counsel is an international nonprofit, litigation, education, and policy organization dedicated to advancing religious freedom, the sanctity of life, and the family since 1989, by providing pro bono assistance and representation on these and related topics. 

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