Officials at an Illinois high school who forced their Christian student valedictorian to remove references to Jesus, God, and his faith from his graduation speech will soon be facing a lawsuit after First Liberty Institute -- one of the nation's top religious liberty law firms -- decried the move as a violation of the student's constitutional rights, the Christian Post website reports today (May 24, 2018).
"The most important thing in your life is to find... intimacy with God," Sam Blackledge, the 18-year-old valedictorian of West Prairie High School in Sciota, wrote in his prepared remarks for his graduation on May 19.
He said he turned in a copy of the speech to school officials, but ten minutes before his graduation ceremony, school administrators told him to remove all references to God from his speech and warned him not to discuss his faith.
Jeremy Dys, a lawyer with the nonprofit religious freedom firm First Liberty Institute, who has taken on Blackledge's case, said what the school did was a violation because the valedictorian's speech is protected by federal law. "They actually violated the Constitution," Dys added.
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