The 3 - September 26, 2021

Morality in the educational system is front and center in this week's edition of The 3, featuring a skirmish at a high school football game in Tennessee, where parents and students decided to pray after the game in the face of a challenge to school faculty leading prayers.  Also, in Virginia and Ohio, there are charges that local school boards are promoting pornography in school curriculum. 

But first up, there is an egregious example of the neglect for the sanctity of human life out of the U.S. House of Representatives, which passed a bill that would allow abortion during the entirety of a pregnancy and prevent states from protecting life with legislation.

U.S. House narrowly passes bill allowing abortion throughout the country

The U.S. House has passed a dramatic new pro-abortion piece of legislation that would not only allow abortion during the entirety of a woman's pregnancy but also block pro-life laws passed by individual states.  According to LifeNews.com:

Pro-life leaders said the Abortion Without Limits Up to Birth Act is a more accurate name for the bill. The legislation would erase basically all restrictions on abortion and prevent states from enacting even modest protections for unborn babies. Limits on late-term abortions and bans on sex-selection abortions would be gone.

The legislation would get rid of laws that protect women and girls, too, including parental consent for minors and informed consent laws that ensure mothers receive basic facts about their unborn baby’s development before going through with an abortion.

The article quotes from pro-life champion lawmaker Chris Smith of New Jersey; it says: "He pointed to a 2021 Marist poll that found 65 percent of Americans support allowing states to enact restrictions on abortion – something the bill would stop them from doing."

Football team and parents lead prayer at TN football game

Football season has the potential to bring legal challenges regarding the permissibility of prayer at school events, and this year, a flashpoint has occurred in Tennessee, according to Faithwire, which reports that recently "...administrators with Putnam County Schools told staffers they would be barred from leading students in prayer in the future, a decision that came as a result of a letter from the group Americans United for Separation of Church and State, according to WZTV-TV."

But, parents were not deterred from stepping in to lead students in prayer. The Faithwire article said:

The district, for its part, acknowledged “the importance of prayer in the lives of our students, faculty, and staff members,” saying in a statement to the press that administrators “support the right of students to participate in and lead spontaneous prayers.”

After a game involving Upperman High, Bob Vick, described as "a graduate of a PCS school and a fan of the Upperman football team, posted a now-viral image of the demonstration." He wrote, “Satan’s power was defeated tonight, as the threat of legal action to forbid prayer after the game was overwhelmed by player lead prayer, supported by parents and fans in solidarity on Overall Field..."

Fighting back against porn in schools

Across America, parents have been showing up en masse to confront school boards on a variety of issues, from mask mandates to the teaching of critical race theory to inappropriate material being taught to students, as was the case in Fairfax County, Virginia, where a parent, Stacy Langton, spoke up; a report from The Daily Wire said:

A Virginia mom found that books graphically depicting pedophilia were in her child’s school as part of its commitment to diversity and inclusion — so she read from them, verbatim, to the school board.

The school board’s reaction was ironic: It silenced her, citing that there were children in the room.

And, in Hudson, Ohio, a mayor took the local school board to task for allowing the promotion of pornography in the local schools. The Akron Beacon Journal reported that:

Some Hudson City Council members want the mayor to apologize for calling on school board members to resign or potentially face criminal charges over mature content in a book at the high school.

Mayor Craig Shubert gave the resign-or-be-charged ultimatum to the Board of Education on Sept. 13 after multiple parents complained about some sex scene writing prompts contained in a book called "642 Things to Write About" provided to high school students taking a college credit course. The book has been removed from the course by school officials.

The head of the school board said the members did not intend to resign, and the mayor said he would not back down, even after being chided by the county's prosecutor, who said that the material was not "child pornography."