SHJ EXPRESSES DEEP DISAPPOINTMENT IN SUPREME COURT PRAYER DECISION

May 5, 2014 – The Society for Humanistic Judaism expressed its deep disappointment in the decision issued today by the Supreme Court in Town of Greece v. Galloway. In a 5-4 decision, the Court ruled in favor of sectarian legislative prayer. The Court upheld the town’s practice of inviting only Christian clergy to deliver the invocations. Most of the prayers were unmistakably Christian in nature. Such sectarian prayer supports a specific set of religious beliefs, excluding both the beliefs of other faiths and of the non-religious. For the Court to allow such a practice to continue upholds government-supported religious expression, a clear violation of the First Amendment Establishment Clause.

The SHJ had joined the Center for Inquiry, the American Humanist Association, Americans for Religious Liberty and other secular organizations in filing a friend-of-the-court brief in the case opposing the practice of the Town of Greece.