High School Football

[Joseph Brossart]

An AP article at http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/a/AP-School-Prayer.html
previews the High-School Football season.  Some exerpts follow:


<<BOGUE CHITTO, Miss. (AP) -- Wide receiver Scott Edwards says high school
football and prayer go hand-in-hand on Friday nights and no court can change
that.

The 16-year-old son of a Baptist preacher and many of his classmates at
Bogue Chitto High are counting on fans in this little Mississippi community
to restore prayer to the stadium legally -- with individuals deciding, on
their own, to join hands and recite the Lord's Prayer.

The students' effort is part of a grass-roots movement, mainly in
communities across the South, to encourage ``spontaneous'' prayer as a way
to get around a U.S. Supreme Court ruling barring school officials from
letting students lead stadium crowds in prayer.

...

The movement, which has gained momentum over the past couple of weeks, was
spearheaded in Mississippi by radio talk-show host Paul Ott, who used his
syndicated call-in program, ``Listen to the Eagle,'' to get his message out
on stations in Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Alabama and Arkansas.

...

Jim Keith, the attorney for the school district, said as long as the school
isn't orchestrating the prayer, there's no harm done. ``If fans are sitting
in the stand, and they want to branch out and say the Lord's Prayer, or some
prayer to Allah or whoever, they can do that,'' Keith said.

In Asheville, N.C., churchgoers are making a similar push for
``spontaneous'' prayer at high school games. In South Carolina, crowds plan
to gather around the goal post and in the bleachers to recite the Lord's
Prayer before high school games.

Elsewhere in Mississippi, people in Hattiesburg and Tupelo plan to
distribute fliers urging fans to pray at football games in those
communities, said J.D. Simpson of First Priority, a national campus ministry
for junior high and high schools.

And the American Family Association, a conservative group in Tupelo, is also
urging students and spectators at high school games across the country to
recite the Lord's Prayer. >>

Looks like it is going to be quite a season.

Joseph Brossart
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