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High School Coach Who Got Fired For Praying Scores Massive Victory, Awarded $1.7 Million Settlement

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2 years ago

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After being fired for leading his players in on-field prayers, a football coach in Washington state will be reinstated and receive additional compensation.

When coach Joseph Kennedy began praying at the 50-yard line after games back in 2015, the school district grew concerned and suspended him in 2015. Now, Joseph Kennedy, who was fired eight years ago, has returned to his old position and will receive a $1.78 million settlement.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote, β€œRespect for religious expressions is indispensable to life in a free and diverse republic. Here, a government entity sought to punish an individual for engaging in a personal religious observance, based on a mistaken view that it has a duty to suppress religious observances even as it allows comparable secular speech. The Constitution neither mandates nor tolerates that kind of discrimination.”

β€œGovernment is not free to disregard the First Amendment in times of crisis. At a minimum, that Amendment prohibits government officials from treating religious exercises worse than comparable secular activities, unless they are pursuing a compelling interest and using the least restrictive means available,” the judge continued. β€œIt is time, past time, to make plain that, while the pandemic poses many grave challenges, there is no world in which the Constitution tolerates color-coded executive edicts that reopen liquor stores and bike shops but shutter churches, synagogues and mosques.”



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