Prayer ban lifted in Houston VA cemetery
COB6 sends us a link to an article from his undisclosed location which announces that the Department of Veterans Affairs as agreed in a court-sponsored settlement to stop preventing mourners from praying at funerals in Houston’s VA cemetery;
The documents state that VA will pay attorneys fees and expenses of $215,000, but the government admits no liability or fault, and stresses that some provisions of the agreement already were policy or practice at the department.
Under the settlement, VA would agree “not to ban, regulate or otherwise interfere with prayers, recitations, or words of religious expression absent family objection” and to allow veterans’ families to hold services with any religious or secular content they desire.
VA also agrees not to edit or control private religious speech by speakers at VA-sponsored ceremonies or events and pledges to return a Bible, cross and Star of David to the cemetery’s chapel, which must remain open and not be used for storage or referred to as a meeting facility
Allowing someone to pray to their own God in a government cemetery isn’t establishing a religion, so I don’t know where those gumballs at VA decided that it was a good idea to prevent prayer.
Category: Veterans' Affairs Department
This whole damned liberal claim of “Separation of Church and State” is absurd. I open a copy of the constitution nearly daily to read and absorb one item or another.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;”
How can they distort that very clear statement, to mean that we cannot pray even in a public forum? And to consider the mindset of the framers, it is even more clear. They were establishing that gummint could not do as the Brits did in ordering that the Church of England was to be the religion of the nation.
Nobody [except for radicals perhaps] wish to deny the ability to pray in public forum. What those of us who advocate for a separation of church and state want to insure, is that nobody is compelled to to participate in such activities.
I’ve also read the legal brief from the defendants perspective on this case, and I come away understanding that volunteers at the cemetery were instructed to offer to “families the option of reciting at the committal services any religious or non-religious text or recitationspecifically requested by the families, and not providing them with any religious or non-religioustext or recitation when it is not specifically requested by the families. The volunteers weregenerally advised that they should make an effort to ensure that the military funeral honors performed respect the families’ religious preferences.”
I realize that the plaintiffs have a differing opinion.
$215,000, that should have been used helping out wounded soldiers, wasted on legal fees.
Two sources for the VA’s earlier, execrable decision:
1. Atheist
2. Lawyer
It only takes one of each to tie our government in knots. AQ ought to hire a couple of each just for this purpose.
I think the VA has it correct. The VFW is not entitled to come to the funeral of a Jewish Soldier and offer a prayer in Jesus name. This is real simple stuff. I am appalled that the VFW would think this is OK and that they are being victimized.