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Bastrop, LA – Graduating seniors at Bastrop High School in Louisiana did not let a complaint stop them from praying this past weekend during their graduation ceremony. One student complained and threatened to contact the ACLU if the school did not remove its longtime tradition of prayer from its graduation ceremony. Liberty Counsel sent a letter offering pro bono representation to Morehouse Parish Schools.

After the one student complained, the school attorney recommended removing the prayer from the ceremony. The school had to reprint all the graduation programs at the expense of the district to remove the mention of prayer and replace it with a “Moment of Silence.” Mitzi Quinn, who has been on the staff at the school for almost 25 years, said there have been students who were atheist, agnostic, and other non-Christian religions in the past who “had no problems” with the traditional prayer.

Liberty Counsel sent a letter to the school officials, setting forth the law and offering to provide counsel and defense at no cost. The graduating seniors did not allow the threat of the ACLU stop them. The ACLU asked the school to make sure that no prayer was offered at graduation. But when graduating senior Laci Rae Mattice stood at the podium to ask the students to join her in a moment of silence, she drew cheers and applause when she said, “I want to ask for the Lord’s blessings upon us.” She then led the audience in the “Lord’s Prayer.”

Mathew D. Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel and Dean of Liberty University School of Law, commented: “The Constitution does not require that graduation be free of religious people or speech. Students have the right to express secular and religious viewpoints at graduation. To censor only the religious viewpoints is intolerant and unconstitutional. Students should not be bullied by the ACLU to give up their constitutional rights.”

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