Colorado Teacher Sues District Over Bibles, Prayer Circles At Public School

A Florence, Colorado school teacher has filed a lawsuit against his district, saying that the public school where he used to teach is blatantly promoting religion, thanks largely to a local church that treats the school as its own private “mission field,” The Denver Post is reporting.

Robert Basevitz claims in a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Denver that the presence of Florence’s Cowboy Church is “ubiquitous” at Florence High School. He claims that students are given personalized Bibles, offered “Jesus Pizza” prayer groups during lunch in school classrooms, and offered a variety of church-sponsored on-campus activities; as many as five per day in some cases.

Basevitz’s attorney, Paul Maxon, said the Colorado school’s actions clearly violated the First Amendment’s “establishment clause,” which says that government is not allowed to endorse a religion – especially in a public school, according to CBS Denver.

“Government and public schools need to remain neutral on questions of religion so that you and I are not forced to (be exposed to) someone else’s personal religious beliefs. This is not one or two isolated incidents. On a single day, there were no less than five school-sponsored religious events. That is a pervasive involvement with religion, which is illegal.”

The suit also alleges that a local pastor – Randy Pfaff – uses the school’s public address system to pray and preach to the students.

Pfaff, the pastor at Cowboy Church and the man behind the multitude of faith-based events at Florence High School, refuses to apologize.

“I don’t believe the Constitution was meant to keep God out of the schools. That’s absolutely absurd. This nation was founded on Christianity.”

At issue in the lawsuit are whether the prayer meetings, concerts, Bible studies, and other faith-based activities at the school are an unconstitutional advancement of religion or simply a matter of students exercising their own First Amendment rights.

The courts have typically held that faith-based events – such as prayer groups at school – are OK if they are student-led, according to West Word. Basevitz claims in his suit, however, that the faith-based events at Florence High School, while ostensibly student-led, are really just fronts for Pastor Pfaff’s church activities.

Basevitz’s lawsuit is asking the court to declare the religious activities at Florence High School unconstitutional and also asks for “nominal” monetary damages for the teacher.

[Images courtesy of Basevitz v. Fremont RE-2 School District]