by David Cruz
Church groups may have to look elsewhere if they were to celebrate Easter or Passover inside an available public school.
A federal court has sided with the city Department of Education in ruling that religious practice in public schools is unconstitutional.
The decision, part of a decades-long lawsuit brought by several Bronx church groups, now jeopardizes any Easter/Passover plans made by church groups.
“Mayor [Bill de Blasio] with a single swipe of his pen can offer immediate relief to thousands of his fellow New Yorkers who now face the prospect of not knowing if they will have a place to celebrate the Easter or Passover holiday,” said Councilman Fernando Cabrera, who led a fight to allow church groups to practice in public schools so long as they were empty.
He previously attempted to circumvent the DOE’s policy by introducing two bills that called for churches to practice in schools.
The city Law Department argued that the policy to allow church groups into Bronx schools violated the First Amendment.
Cabrera, a practicing preacher at a local church within his 14th Council District, was disappointed over the ruling. Still, a glimmer of hope seemed to prevail in him, hoping “Mayor Bill de Blasio, as promised, [can] move quickly and reverse this discriminatory policy aimed exclusively at houses of worship.”
The city appealed their case to the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals last summer after a lower court sided with the church groups headed by The Bronx Household of Faith in University Heights.
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Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.
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the headline is incorrect. The judges did not say “no worship in school”. The court that heard the case said just the opposite. Vacant space in public schools when not in school use can be rented to groups for community activities. Garden clubs, girl scouts, AA etc. The court said that religious groups should not be discriminated against. Bloomberg administration has appealed this. The First Amendment calls for separation of church and state. It does not prohibit ACCOMODATION of certain types of church activities. One example: the government provides and pays for religious chaplains of all faiths in our armed forces and in prisons where citizens are helped in their First Amendment rights to worship where ordinary church services are not available. In the best American traditions, NY City has made this school use available for worship as to other community activities. These religious groups are generally of the poor, who do not have the funds to build their own churches. NYC is thus helping this sector of our city to exercise their First Amendment rights.
Your response is incomplete. The Department of Education during the Bloomberg administration forbade religious groups from practicing in school, that’s what these religious groups want to do because they have no place to pray. Part of the package in allowing these religious groups is they take part in non-denominational activities within the school. The DOE argues that religious groups can confuse children over whether the school is favoring one religion over the other, thus barring them from practicing.