A Texas school district has assured the Freedom From Religion Foundation that it will stop publicizing private religion-infused baccalaureate ceremonies.

FFRF had contacted the Friendswood Independent School District with its concern that a baccalaureate service in the Friendswood High School on May 22 has been advertised on the district's website and in a handout sent home with seniors.

"Public school cannot organize or promote baccalaureate services," FFRF Staff Attorney Sam Grover wrote to legal counsel for the school district. "The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment prohibits public schools from sponsoring any type of religious practices. Baccalaureate programs are religious services that include prayer and worship."

The school district admitted that it had made a mistake in publicizing the event and said it has taken swift measures to rectify the blunder.

"In order to remedy any confusion, Friendswood High School Principal Mark Griffon has sent a memorandum to all senior students indicating that the prior notice was sent in error and that the event is not school-sponsored," the school district's attorney replied. "Friendswood High School has also removed all references to the event from its calendar." 

FFRF is appreciative about the district's willingness to quickly correct itself. While the baccalaureate service itself will still take place, it is a privately sponsored event, as should be every baccalaureate event throughout the country.

"We do commend the swiftness with which the school district has acted," FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor says. "Public schools need to be extra-careful to not promote religious events and fall afoul of the Constitution."

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is dedicated to the separation of state and church, with 23,700 nonreligious members nationwide, including almost 1,000 in Texas.

A Tennessee school district is taking systemic steps to make sure that state-church violations do not recur after the Freedom From Religion Foundation alerted it.

FFRF had learned about a second-grade teacher at Highland Rim Elementary in Fayetteville, Tenn., who helped students construct crosses as a class craft project. She also marked student assignments with a stamp that stated, "GOD MADE YOU SPECIAL."

"Public schools have a duty to ensure that 'subsidized teachers do not inculcate religion' or use their positions of authority to promote a particular religious viewpoint, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled," FFRF Legal Fellow Ryan Jayne wrote to Bill Heath, director of Lincoln County Schools. "Religious endorsement is particularly troubling when it is presented to such young and impressionable students." 

FFRF also pointed out that Christian art projects in public schools are exclusionary, since nearly 30 percent of Americans practice a minority religion or no religion at all, with 23 percent of adults and 35 percent of millennials identifying as nonreligious.

Lincoln County Schools heard FFRF loud and clear. It replied with a letter detailing a five-point action plan that the district is implementing. These include measures concerning the specific teacher, but the most important step is: "As a system, we will use this opportunity to have a local attorney speak to our teachers in August and September about this and similar concerns."

FFRF is delighted with the plan.

"Violations like these need to be dealt with in a systematic way," says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. "We're happy that Lincoln County Schools is taking that approach."

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is dedicated to the separation of state and church, with 23,700 nonreligious members nationally, including almost 300 in Tennessee.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation will be running a full-page ad in Sunday's Tulsa (Okla.) World and Wichita (Kan.) Eagle asking the question, "What does the bible really say about abortion?"

The answer is (as the ad puts it): "There is no biblical justification for the assault on women's reproductive rights."

The advertisement features a compelling portrait of birth control crusader Margaret Sanger, and her quote: "No woman can call herself free who does not own and control her body." It documents that the bible does not condemn abortion and, in fact, "shows an utter disregard for human life." The ad reminds the reader: "We live under a secular Constitution that wisely separates religion from government, and protects women's reproductive rights."

The ad is funded and was largely written by Brian Bolton, a retired professor and Life Member of FFRF, in memory of FFRF's principal founder Anne Nicol Gaylor (1926-2015), who was propelled into freethought activism by her experiences working to legalize abortion in the late 1960s and early '70s. Gaylor observed that the battle for women's rights "would never end" until the root cause of women's oppression, "religion and its control of our government," is challenged.

The ad refers the reader for more information to Bolton's article, "God is So Not Pro-Life" and FFRF's nontract "What Does the Bible Say About abortion?"

The ad first debuted earlier this spring in the Austin American-Statesman and will appear later this month in the Houston Chronicle.

FFRF warmly thanks Brian Bolton, who lives in Texas, for his generous support and commitment. Bolton additionally sponsors FFRF's annual graduate student essay contest.

For more information on bible sexism and its reach into civil law, also see Woe to the Women: The Bible Tells Me So, by Annie Laurie Gaylor, published by FFRF.

A Kentucky town will stop displaying an overtly religious nativity scene in response to a Freedom From Religion Foundation objection.

FFRF had notified the city of Walton a number of times that a Christmas nativity panorama on the City Hall lawn was in violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

"It is unlawful for the city to maintain, erect or host a nativity scene, thus singling out, showing preference for and endorsing one religion," FFRF Legal Fellow Ryan Jayne wrote to Walton Mayor Mark Carnahan last December. "The Supreme Court has ruled it is impermissible to place a nativity scene as the sole focus of a display on government property." 

After the December letter and a follow-up in April, FFRF has finally gotten an assurance that the town would take heed of the Constitution.

"I have discussed the legal issues raised in your correspondence dated Dec. 23, 2015, with Mayor Carnahan and advised him accordingly," Walton City Attorney Timothy Noyes wrote back to Jayne. "Based on that advice, the mayor indicated that future Christmas displays on city property, if any, will give due deference to existing law concerning separation of church and state." 

FFRF will keep an eye on whether the city follows through on its promise.

"The city of Walton must make good on its assurance from this year onward," says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. "Once the government confers endorsement for one religion over others, it strikes a blow at religious liberty, forcing taxpayers of all faiths and of no religion to support a particular expression of worship."

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a national organization dedicated to the separation of state and church, with 23,700 nonreligious members nationwide, including more than 100 in Kentucky.